


Lover, Thalassic

by exomostlyhuman



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Angst, Imprisonment, M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-26
Updated: 2017-04-26
Packaged: 2018-10-24 09:16:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 26,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10738698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/exomostlyhuman/pseuds/exomostlyhuman
Summary: There are some feelings you can’t turn off, no matter what you find out about each other.





	Lover, Thalassic

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Round 1 of Exo_Mostlyhuman (Prompt #50) by [lowartic](http://lowarctic.livejournal.com/profile)
> 
> Author Notes: I wasn’t entirely sure if the original prompter meant a siren as in a mermaid/merman or as in the sirens from Greek Mythology, so I merged them both together for this fic. The siren has the ability to have aquatic features and feathered wings. Thank you to DU for putting up with all the whining over the plot, it helped me a lot.

Yixing’s feet dipped into the water at the edge of the beach, his toes curled under the diminishing foam that crawled up the sand and his throat constricted with a song. There was a strong thumping coming from his spine, his feet began to web and his fingers glistened an opalescent green shade. His whole body called for him to remain by the sea, to find his home amongst the rocks and coves of unoccupied spaces; resisting had always been the hardest part. He belonged at the waterline, he needed the oceans to stretch vastly in front of him and for the salt to sting around his eyes. Half his heart lay beneath the waves he could only look at in silence. Half his head listened out for the sweet songs that flew like birds through the air to him calling him, luring him.

“If you look out there any longer, I’d say you want to go in,” a deep voice whispered against his neck and he shuddered at the inhumanly hot breath that touched it, strong arms circled around him to make sure he stayed steady. “You don’t have to stay on the shore for my sake.”

“I know,” Yixing hummed, and he really did know. “It’s just better to be with you than alone in the water.”

“If you say so.” A soft kiss was pushed against his skin and he let himself be pulled away from the waves that licked like flames at his feet. The sand began to stick between his toes and kick up his wet ankles, he knew Yifan hated it with the fiery vehemence of his breath and Yixing had never revealed how at home he felt with that feeling.

They lived in the mountains, cohabiting in a house made of metal, slate and glass that jutted out on a large perch in the middle of nowhere. They were so far from the sea, it was always out of reach and Yixing only had the snow to surround himself in, and Yifan, too. The couple came down from the peaks when they stayed with Yifan’s parents, it was infrequent for them to visit and they were on their way back to the home they shared in the cold recesses of the country.

Yifan looked at Yixing for a few moments, making the younger look around to him as they stilled on the beach and the dragon let his waist go for a few minutes, the elder bowed his head to be in line with Yixing’s mouth, “I can fly home and you can stay here for a few days more, I know how you like the warmth and the sun.”

The smaller considered it for a few minutes, rolling the idea of swimming without inhibitions under the sky and relishing in the form he had only taken a few times since his adolescence. Then he simply looked at the worried glint in the dragon’s eyes, the fiery golds and reds swirled just beneath the surface like lava under the calm sheen of brown. The dragon had always been protective and Yixing was sure that Yifan assumed that he was the only one who knew what lurked around the sea.

“No, I’ll feel better if I drive with you,” Yixing smiled uneasily as he spoke, only finding comfort in the fact that all heat was extinguished from Yifan’s eyes immediately. “You’re warm enough for me, anyway.”

Yifan unwrapped himself from Yixing instantly, he took his hand instead and drew him towards his brand new Jaguar SUV. Being with Yifan was a shift from the lifestyle he’d been raised in; the humble fishing household he had been a part of with his single parent family was a world away from him. Yifan had money and a clan where Yixing only had his father and working days from the moment he could think for himself. He loved Yifan and with that came all the extras he had to accept; blazing tempers from his family, flaming passion and the scaly creature that remained beneath the surface of his skin.

Yixing looked over his shoulder once more to the sea, the ache in his back and feet disappeared with each step he took. He knew he would feel fine when he was back in his own home with his boyfriend, a secret was always hard to keep when the catalyst for change was just out of reach.

 

i.

 

Their home in the mountains was structured with large windows, strong metal beams and hints of cool blues around the edges. Yixing was surprised that Yifan liked the cold so much, especially being that he was a partly cold blooded animal and raised in the warm south yet he seemed to adore where they lived. They had furnished the house together, a joint project when they decided to leave the city they met in and travel for hours up the country; there were markers of themselves singularly and together everywhere. Photographs covered a wall in their lounge from floor to ceiling, most of them included the couple save for the few of Yifan’s family, their friends and Yixing’s father. Nothing of his mother. The half-siren had thought it best to not have any reminders of her, reminders of himself, in the area the couple lingered in the most. It made it easier to hide and keep the secret from Yifan.

Yixing’s favourite part was the fireplace with its hot flames and glowing coals that funnelled up through the roof however the beautiful part was the back. It glittered like pure obsidian and glinted like a black kaleidoscope as the tongues of fire licked at it, Yixing was mesmerised so often by its beauty that it would distract him from everything else. Very few of their human guests know what the shining darkness really was, Yifan and Yixing always claimed that it was tinted glass whenever asked, but it was a perfectly fitted layer of dragon scales. When Yifan shed his skin with the season turn, the scales seemed to harden and turn a more glossy black colour rather than stay their matte black and silver. Their fireplace hadn’t been lined with the material for any aesthetic reason, it was simply to keep Yixing safe enough to leave the fire to burn through the night if Yifan weren’t ever able to shield him from a fire that had escaped those confines. Everybody who knew about dragons knew that they were completely resistant to fire in any of their forms and the shed scales retained that ability to deflect heat. It was a safety precaution, and a magnificent one at that.

Their living room led openly into their kitchen, there were more photographs on the walls but there were mainly wipeable tiles and pots labelled with the name of the contents inside. That space was warm and inviting, just like the living area, despite the cold, modernist exterior of the house. There was a dining area in the next room that was parted with a glass wall, to keep things intimate while inclusive during parties and gatherings. Not that they had many, being the only people around for miles.

It did feel like home when Yixing took his feet out of his slippers and dug his toes into the fur rugs they had in every room or settled in the soft, fur throws they bought from their most local village. The house was always warm inside, even with all the windows, and Yixing relished in that. Especially on the days when Yifan was out flying one of his longer flights, those ones were the most special of days because they were rare.

It was when Yixing would head into the garage, pick up a bucket and scoop out a fair amount of salt from the industrial sized bag that always kept full in order to sprinkle on their driveway to keep the ice at bay. He could walk through the house, pour the contents of the bucket into their large bath then fill that with hot water.

The half-siren would slip into the bath and relax for a little while until the water shimmered then rippled. Yixing’s hips and legs changed to bind together and he dipped his fingers below the surface to feel aquatic scales beneath his fingers. They were smooth, almost slimy to the touch but that didn’t stop him from touching where his skin met the monofin. Yifan going out flying for hours upon hours was the only time Yixing could connect with that side of him. Although he couldn’t remember the last time he let his wings out, it was most likely during his childhood when he was still discovering that he wasn’t a normal human. Salty water was all Yixing needed to unleash his tail and since he had last been to the sea, he couldn’t resist the urge.

Those baths did not quell the want to swim, the need to undulate his hips to be able to flick his toes out as he swam through currents was did not ebb away like the burning of his muscles under his skin had. He couldn’t do such things until the almost non-existent summer months when the lakes melted for a day at most and Yifan flew further away, higher into the sky to soak in sunlight to his almost serpentine body.

Yixing wished he could be as free about his mystical form with Yifan as the elder was with him. The younger got to feel, touch and meet Yifan as a dragon with his burning breath, reptilian eyes and large claws. Yixing had had even flown on dragon Yifan’s black and silver scaled back a few times. Though, that always led to days of a backache for the half-siren as his own wings begged to come out so he could fly with Yifan. Not on Yifan.

But he was content with his baths, the could flick water around and change his legs back quickly when he heard the door a floor below open and close. Yifan had thought it to be a quirk, Yixing’s salt baths, one that was about keeping his skin exfoliated and Yixing had always smiled along with the elder’s soft teasing.

When Yixing did hear Yifan enter, his fingers had begun to crinkle and his body made a few popping sounds as his legs became two flesh covered limbs, not a singular fin. He rose out of the water once the plug had been pulled, encased himself in a fluffy towel he’d placed on the heated rack and made his way out into the bedroom he shared with Yifan. The older of the two was already in the upstairs corridor at that time and his eyes fell on Yixing’s towel clad body as soon as he walked in through the door.

“I wonder how many people would murder to be in my place to see this sight straight after walking in through the front door?” Yifan’s words seemed sleazy but his smile was wide, genuine and guilt inducing. “How are you human?”

Yixing laughed in the way he always did when Yifan said such things, the one that covered his guilt thickly and made lying that little bit harder every time. He stayed still, just watching, as the dragon made his way over and pressed his fingers onto Yixing’s shoulders. “Are you cold?”

The half-siren shook his head but Yifan’s arms went around his waist, where his towel was tied and pulled him closer. It was impossible not to feel at home when the dragon’s chest grew warm and Yixing could snuggle into it with his hands curled into Yifan’s clothes.

It was late evening, the winter sky had turned a lavender colour, it spread warmth into the bedroom as Yifan guided Yixing over to the bed. They had already eaten and there wasn’t much else to do than to climb into bed, switch the television on and spend the hours before sleeping curled up with one another. Yifan always grew slightly clingy after flying, the elder had said something about not wanting to have Yixing feel like he flew to get away from him, and Yixing did it to remind himself that Yifan loved him. Even if Yifan didn’t know everything.

 

ii.

 

Normality ensued as Yixing spent time apart from the sea, his urges died as his instincts retreated back and Yixing didn't think anything more of it. Yifan worked, as did Yixing, but their free time was always spent wrapped up with one another. Other than when Yifan was out flying but Yixing never really cared that he would be alone in those times, the other had always told him that a dragon without his wings was no dragon at all and Yixing would never be the one to get in the way of that. 

They would eat dinner together on the floor next to the windows, they'd migrate to the sofa and Yifan would cuddle Yixing up to keep him warm as the fire died. It always happened that they would end up naked, often not even with sexual intent; more like a baring of softness to the other and Yixing would have to coax Yifan off the sofa to go to bed with kisses.

Yifan was always the one to wake second in the mornings, he'd grumble lowly as he roused and throw an arm around Yixing, who'd often be sat up against the headboard with his sketchbook in hand, scribbling ideas or trying to sketch the way Yifan's lips pouted out slightly in his slumber. The dragon would bury his nose in Yixing's hip, his floppy bed hair would tickle the younger's skin and his eyelashes would flutter gently against the bare flesh there too. Yixing never recoiled from those touches.

Dragons weren't much for softness but Yifan on his sleepy mornings was the gentlest of beings in the way he would kiss up Yixing's side until their lips were in line before he would speak his first words of the day. Everything was a cold Prussian blue colour, it often cast raw tones into the room but Yifan always soaked him in warmth.

It was a struggle to pluck Yifan out of bed without the elder letting his chest rumble with a dragonesque growl; kisses didn't work in those moments because Yixing was always drawn back under the duvet and kissed until his mind went blank of all responsibilities. It was Yixing leaving the bedroom, trailing down to the kitchen and cooking breakfast that had Yifan appearing in at the bottom of the stairs with a hand pressed sleepily to his eyes.

Yifan would leave soon after then, once he was showered and dressed, to drive off to work to start their routine all over again. The house wasn't lonely without Yifan during the day, Yixing worked hard and occupied himself until his boyfriend walked through the front door. He didn't have the time or the thought space to miss the other, though he knew he would if he gave into those thoughts.

It wasn't unlike Yixing to be sprawled out across the floor while he worked on his laptop, there were usually hundreds of pieces of paper, pens and pencils all over the living room floor and he could while away his hours sketching and designing things for his clients. He was organised until he started working because then his ability to keep track of 0.2MM fine liners and his 0.5MM ones went out the window. Yifan usually came back to the mess that became progressively littered with empty, cold and half-drunk cups of coffee. He never scolded Yixing for it, he always sank down onto the sofa and watched the younger do his work.

Yixing always liked that, he could sense the admiration from Yifan and that always gave him a wave of inspiration whenever it had begun to wane at around six in the evening.

However, Yixing could feel the dark, thunderous clouds that followed his boyfriend in through the front door and in the steps that echoed through the foyer one day; the sounds of his entry ricocheted differently to normal. Yifan was advancing towards Yixing. Not swanning across the tiles like he usually did.

The half-siren moved closer into himself because he knew that an angry dragon was not one to be messed with no matter who was present. He worked quietly and swiftly to finish up, he even moved to clean up after himself as quickly as he could to not rile Yifan up even more with his messiness. There was a list of reasons why Yifan may not have been his normal relaxed self and Yixing knew that any of those plausible situations could take hours to calm Yifan down from. Dragon tempers were volatile things however Yixing had developed numerous techniques to soften Yifan up over the years.

Yixing's brows drew together when the steps didn't stop in the living room, instead, they continued on and Yixing's heart started hammering as he cleaned up faster. It resulted in a knocked over a cup of coffee running over one of his designs, he muttered a curse and began trying to salvage what he could of the sheets.

He reached out to his paper as a hand wrapped around his upper arm and yanked him up until he was up off of the floor with his feet skidding across the rug he'd been sat on and his whole body turned rigid.

"Yifan," he yelped, half in fright and the other half in shock. "What's wrong with you?"

Yifan didn't say anything. Yixing could see his eyes, though. They swirled like a black rock in lava, they were not a deep shade of brown that Yixing looked into affectionately so often, it was terrifying to see the irises like that through anything but worry. The angry—no, furious—stare the other fixed on him had his throat closing over in fear. The grip on his arm was firm, taut enough that Yixing's hand began to feel heavy with blood and he reached over with his other hand touch the dragon's wrist. "Yifan?"

The angry male released Yixing as if the younger had scalded him with his fingertips and ran his fingers through his hair, a clear sign of stress and Yixing's back rippled with a want to protect himself. The younger stumbled as he caught his footing again with the lack of strength holding him up and yet he still stepped toward to the older as tentatively as he possibly could.

"Have you ever lied to me?" Yifan muttered whilst his eyes burned ever hotter and Yixing gulped, the heat in Yifan's irises seemed to have dried up the entirety of Yixing's mouth and throat like the sun in a drought.

"No," he croaked out.

He could see Yifan's face darken, even more, each of his features turned intensely threatening and Yixing could feel his spine-rattling further. His wings sang into his head that he should let them out, that he should use them to protect himself from a threat. But the human half of him could see the way Yifan's hands balled up at his sides, how his pupils changed size as he battled against his own anger and Yixing knew conflict anywhere, especially on Yifan.

Yifan's fingers delved into his pocket without speaking and drew something out slowly. His hand trembled as he held the object out. That had Yixing's heart stopping for a few beats as he took the item in. It was a simple silver chain that had a small sized pebble dangling from it, the stone itself was a black fire opal; it resembled the look of Yifan's eyes. Yixing couldn't answer as his mouth fell open slightly, he could feel the sting of tears in his own orbs. "Is this what I think it is? If I am wrong then tell me."

Yifan held the necklace tighter as Yixing's head nodded in the affirmative almost instantly as he searched his own chest for the item. "Fan, I—"

The dragon's eyes set on him, they were almost wholly red and that was more than enough to cut him off. Yixing tried to stumble away from the other again but he felt pinned down by his gaze. There was no longer only the fury in those eyes, hurt and upset danced there too. The dragon ground his teeth before he spoke again. "Why do you have this? Why do you have a siren's pendant?"

"I—"

Yixing wasn't allowed to answer before the other's next questions came out and made him freeze where he was stood. "Where did you get it? Where did you get this thing from?"

"M-m-my mo-mother."

"Why did your mother have one?" Yifan, again, did not let Yixing respond before he spoke once more. "Are you human?" Yifan sounded like he was holding his breath, containing himself from unleashing the full wrath of his feelings and it made Yixing feel the actionless damage. "Don't lie, please be honest with me."

The words were laced with something vulnerable as if Yifan would break if he found out the truth. Yixing couldn't speak. He shook his head. That seemed to be more than enough.

Yifan's anger resembled an explosion as the amulet was thrown powerfully across the room, it clattered against the wall hard enough that Yixing feared that it would shatter on the slates. The younger dashed across the room, having found the courage to break out from the penetrating glare, his hands reached out for the pendant instantly and he held it as close to his chest as soon as he could. It was the only thing he had left of his mother's.

Nothing was said as Yifan watched him cradle the item to his chest, tears fell from the smaller man's eyes and he was verging on certain that Yifan's eyes had cooled down to pool with his own tears. "You're a—"

The feeling of having Yifan know what he was strange and it did nothing but settle with an uncomfortable weight of guilt in his stomach. There had been a vision that there would be a sense of relief with his boyfriend knowing who he really was but instead, he felt like a gutted fish with his innards out on display. He was afraid. Not necessarily of Yifan but more of what was going to happen next.

"You lied to me." Yifan sibilated as he approached Yixing, he continued to clench his fists and Yixing could feel the aura of betrayal radiating off Yifan in waves that he couldn't fight against. "Do you realise what you—" Yifan took one step closer, his shoe caught on the edge of Yixing's jeans and the half-siren flinched away, he knew Yifan would never harm him but his body seemed to think otherwise in reaction to the elder's coiled stance. And yet, Yixing was sure that nothing could have hurt him anymore that the next words from the other's lips: "This—we—are over, Yixing."

The dragon twisted on his heel as his hands pushed back up into his hair to pull at the strands while Yixing's eyes flooded with too much fluid to see clearly, he walked away from Yixing in a blurry form of black and went straight back out through the front door that slammed shut with a house shuddering force behind him. The sounds of tires on the gritted driveway screeched and ground in a strange cacophony. Yixing curled up further into himself on the floor with the pendant clutched in his hands and water drowning his eyes. He couldn't see, he could barely feel, as he sobbed into the empty house he'd been abandoned in.

He didn't move from his spot, even when the sun went down later in the evening. Yixing felt as though he was stranded on an island waiting for Yifan to return to him. He knew the dragon wouldn't. Yixing was a siren. He embodied everything Yifan and his family despised with each of their shimmering scales. Even with that, Yixing had lied to him for years. Not only was it a cold resentment he'd induced but a tearing sense of dishonesty.

Yixing felt hollow so deep down that the marrows of his bones felt like despairing caves no sound or light could fill. His hands shook around his mother's necklace as he held it close to his chest. He could almost hear the soothing songs he could vaguely remember coming from the seas when he was a child, the songs that were a sign that she was thinking of him and that she would return soon. He wished with every part of his sparrow heart that the songs would make him feel better but they did nothing to help him, they made everything in the house seem benign and unimportant.

The fire burned low, to a dying ember, and Yixing no longer felt the warmth on his body but he didn't mind that, it was easier to not mind it as the night drew in. He didn't sleep until his eyes slipped completely out of focus and he crumpled onto himself with an unheard whimper of isolation on the side of the cold mountain.

 

iii.

 

Nothing reverted to normal as days passed by him. The house stayed cold, the mess in the living room had become a permanent fixture and Yixing had taken to sleeping in the bath. He couldn't return to the bed he'd shared with Yifan, all the memories of lavender sunsets and crystal blue mornings would only be tarnished by the ever-present grey looming over him. It wasn't even indulgent, each of his aches and pains. He felt no satisfaction from nudging those bruises on his heart or pressing on the stinging abscesses of loss with his salt laden fingers. Everything was burning him like his skin would bubble up then harden to blacken and become pure carbon, and he knew he deserved it.

His own need to keep Yifan close had overtaken the streak of honesty he had been nurtured into having, he was selfish to have Yifan and his own secret. He knew he couldn't keep them both at the same time but he wished he'd done more to make Yifan stay, to make the dragon listen to his most honest reason; he had lied because he had already fallen in love with Yifan before he knew everything.

He was a teenager, smitten and rosy-cheeked when he met Yifan by chance in his home village. He'd call it love at first sight but he knew better than that; what had felt like instant love in that moment had been the exact thing that had evolved into love.

It was what had him dragging his feet to answer the door every time the bell went in hopes his love had returned to him. Yixing's closest neighbours had been checking in on him, he wasn't sure why at first but they had explained that Yifan's car hadn't been past their house in almost a week and Yixing hadn't approached them about keeping their driveway gritted. Something that he did before every trip with Yifan. They dropped by nearly every day with dishes of food, of which Yixing threw contents away and then scrubbed out the container to give back to them the next time they appeared.

Yixing guessed it was time for their arrival, he had readied himself by washing a little more than usual and had shaved to get rid of the hairs that had begun to scratch at his skin. He felt a little more put together on the outside but internally, he felt utterly lost. So much so that he wore one of Yifan’s shirts that had been hooked over the end of the bed, untouched since the elder’s departure until then and the scent of Yifan had turned stale between the stitches.

The siren stood dumbfounded and exhausted when he took in the sight of one of Yifan's cousins in front of him. The whole Wu clan were tall and imposing, Yixing had always felt so small and vulnerable around them, and Yixing knew that Yifan's family must have known what he was by then. It made those initial moments all the more anxiety-inducing.

Yixing assumed he was there for Yifan's things. The elder hadn't left with anything, after all. He moved to the side to allow the man in without speaking, his head was bowed down and Yixing was ready to hide away in one of the spare bedrooms to avoid Yifan's cousin. Instead, a large hand, one that was far meatier and less primped than Yifan's, wrapped around his wrist.

Lack of eating, sleep and will had removed his energy to fight his way away from the harsh yanks on his arm and he was forcefully pushed into the back of a large SUV. It was warm inside and it smelt faintly like the dragon. Yixing knew he shouldn't have been soothed by that generic scent but it reminded him of the way Yifan would smell after a flight and would seek Yixing out for some home comfort. His fatigue and longing for the warmth of the past had Yixing's eyes falling shut as the man pulled away from the mountain house in his car. A quiet, echoing voice in his head told him that he deserved whatever he got.

He had twisted the emotions of the man that he loved, he had hurt him until he was backed into a corner of rage. Yifan championed honesty over all and Yixing had kept a too-complex-to-solve lie from him for years. He had so many chances to say something about who he really was, he had let each of them slip away and bit his tongue until the very last moment. Yixing couldn't blame Yifan for anything. It was a self-inflicted pain for Yixing, all of it. Yifan didn't have the luxury of controlling his own pain, he'd been crushed by something out of his hands and Yixing had been the one to create that black chasm of betrayal between them.

It used to be easy to justify the lie to himself; he would say holding his secret to his chest and falling in love was better than having no chance with Yifan at all in the beginning. But as simple as that had been to think, he had never fully thought through Yifan finding out. The idea of being openly hated by a whole species frightened him but the notion that Yifan wouldn't love him anymore was far worse.

As scared as he felt, he didn't have the energy to show it; he felt a twisted sense of hope that he could see Yifan once more for a few heartbeats. Yixing knew Yifan's family abhorred sirens, they hated Yixing's kind and they were not above killing them. The half-siren wasn't wishing for death but there was at least a sense of peace in it, especially if he could see the man who was once his dragon lover.

Yixing didn't rouse from his long but fitful sleep until his shoulder was jostled roughly under his body weight, the door going from where he had crooked his neck uncomfortably against it to sleep and his safety belt was the only thing that stopped him from falling straight out of the vehicle. He barely got the plug out of the socket before he was being jerked from the seat.

He blinked blearily a few times before his eyes adjusted to the hot sunlight of the south. He knew where he was before he'd even opened his eyes; the smell was different there, it was thicker somehow. The cold north was sharp and fresh, the south was dry but not quite dusty. There was a familiarity to it, Yixing had been around that air so many times before but never had it felt so suffocating. That, paired with the accusatory gazes of Yifan's parents that Yixing met, made his head bow down and allow himself to be pulled across the large driveway and down some stairs he'd never noticed before.

There was a door that Yixing couldn't see with his sight so low but he heard the handle turn and the hinge creek. A gentle rush of cooler air hit him, raising gooseflesh from his skin. He could feel eyes on him, they burned in a way that Yixing hadn't ever felt before from Yifan's clan and that hurt him that little bit more. He could hear some of the dragons murmuring about how easily he was moving and how they had expected more of a fight.

Yixing, too, had expected that he would put more resistance if he was ever wordlessly extracted from his home and taken somewhere that should have been against his will. But a part of him knew, the wild and instinctive part, told him that Yifan would be there.

He had no illusions of winning the dragon back, or salvaging any part of their relationship, but the week they'd been apart had been the longest amount of time they'd had no contact at all. He was still very much in love with the tall beast. That certainly had not changed and every bone within him urged him to seek the elder out, his glass heart pushed him to find if his boyfriend was faring well and his hands burned to touch the skin on the other's face. He knew he wouldn't be privy to such a thing with how both his wrists were pushed together, sharp plastic was coiled around it and was pulled to be uncomfortable on his trapezium.

The half-siren was pushed to the floor, directly onto his knees and that same was done as his wrists on his ankles. Those tethers burned into his flesh a little more, however. He was twisted into a limp ball, shoved into the back corner of the concrete walls that were so cold that they felt somewhat warm through his thin shirt.

It was then that reality really seemed to sink into his skin. He was not a guest who would sleep in Yifan's childhood bedroom wrapped up in the strong, adoring arms of the dragon. He was there against his own volition because he was something Yifan's kind hated, the rift between the two species ran deeper than oceans and longer than his twenty-four years. He knew that pursuing the dragon came with consequences, that there would be backlash but he hadn't anticipated an end in fear.

His optimistic thought was that Yifan would love him despite his heritage, he doubted that he would ever know if that was correct but he had hoped. He really had not expected to be bound, with what felt like cable ties, in a basement room of Yifan's parents' house, scared and trembling under the eyes of countless dragons.

Yixing watched in fear as Yifan's parents stared across the room at him, he could see almost every person in the clan stood around but Yifan wasn't anywhere in sight. His previous thoughts of finding peace in death left his mind as he saw the burning eyes of everybody surrounding him. He was terrified for his own life, he didn't know how he could defend himself and his fingers found his necklace instantly. The feeling of it in his hands made him seek some sense of calm. Albeit, not much.

Nothing was said but somebody spat at Yixing, he could feel the phlegm filled saliva in his hair until it dripped down onto his face and across his temple. He felt humiliated by the fact he couldn't move to wipe it away. He wanted to cry to call for somebody to rush to his aid but he didn't have anybody. It left him open to a series of spatters from the clan's mouths all over his retreated body. He felt the fluid on his cheeks, dribbling onto his jaw and the worst were those that touched the edge of his lips.

"That's enough," a large, foreboding man hissed like a serpent. Yifan's father. The man who had hugged and kissed Yixing like a son a couple of months before. The man moved with a slithering grace until he was in front of Yixing. "Do you know how much of a fool you've made of my son?"

Yixing knew he wasn't supposed to answer but shook his head weakly anyway. He would have taken any opportunity to rid his face from the wetness splattered all over it.

Yifan's father didn't speak again but stepped back, a few others Yixing half recognised from clan occasions he'd been invited to moved into his place and pulled Yixing up to his feet. As if being spat at and vulnerable to the people around him had not been humiliating enough, they took Yixing back deeper into the bowels of the house that Yixing hadn't even known existed. There was a large room, almost the size of a warehouse and Yixing could see the water-filled container in the centre. Yifan’s shirt was removed from Yixing’s shoulders by cutting him out of it, the same with his jeans and Yixing’s clenched his eyes shut as he felt hands on the waistband of his underwear then scissors cutting those away, too.

He was hoisted up by three dragons onto a platform and pushed instantly into the water. His body shuddered and he fought his urge to change, he willed those thoughts away from himself but he could hear the call from the pendant around his neck, that was always irresistible to him. His legs shimmered, the skin on his ankles cut as pushed against the ties, and joined together until he had his long monofin extended from his torso for just below two metres. He didn't look at anybody, even though they stared at him like spectators watching a morbid sport. He was too ashamed.

 

iv.

 

Yixing's arms ached like they never had before with the ties that had been around them, he was certain that they would have indented or bruised him at the very least. He could barely feel his fingers anymore, sudden relief over the fact he could breathe under the water rushed in because he knew he would have drowned if he didn't have that ability. He didn't often have to rely on his underwater capabilities but his instincts had guided him into breathing through the gills lined up his throat in slits and not his mouth. If it was any other situation, Yixing could have probably laughed over the fact that his imprisonment had brought him closer to that part of his natural makeup.

While that was a sliver of positivity deep in a well of negativity, the accumulation of his arms being disabled, his tail muscles not quite being strong enough to keep him buoyant for long periods of time and the lack of food was eating chipped away at him. He felt far weaker than he ever had before. He was sat at the bottom of the tank, having taken to one of the corners, and he barely even looked up whenever somebody walked into the room anymore.

He was never spoken to. Not one of the dragons tried to converse with him as the hours passed and the ones who guarded him changed. The most contact he'd had was when a handful of them spat at the glass of his tank. It always made him flinch but he never stared back defiantly, as he would have wanted to do through fear of the consequences.

The heaviest burden he carried was the fact that Yifan hadn't yet visited him, not even to express his anger or hurt. Yixing had never felt so alone with only the ever so dull weight of his amulet around his neck before. There had always been a hand in his, whether that was from his father or Yifan, and he'd never known anything different. It was strange, being alone, he suggested to himself. He had never known the creeping feeling of emptiness and lack of connection.

It was possibly the seventh day when somebody tapped on his tank. He ignored it, thinking that it was an accidental knock but when the tapping appeared by his ear, he turned to the noise and saw a familiar face. He hadn't felt the hope that it would have been Yifan, he didn't think he could wish for such a thing but was surprised to see one of Yifan's younger cousins there.

He knew the boy was sixteen and Korean, that particular extension of the Wu family had most likely been called over to be there for the rest of the group as support or guidance over the matter of Yixing's existence. He remembered Sehun well, he had met him countless times over the years and had always liked him. His temperament was soft for a dragon but Yixing was sure he could be fierce, much like how Yifan on occasion.

The young dragon held a notepad and a pen, which Yixing eyed curiously as the boy looked over his shoulder quickly at the door.

'I have food, swim up?'

The question was written in shaky and unsteady Chinese but Yixing understood it enough to see what the Korean had meant. Yixing shook his head, his neck cracked with the movement but he didn't harbour much trust for the dragons he was surrounded with, even if they were young and softhearted.

The dragon seemed to read his apprehension like a book and scribbled down: 'I won't hurt you.'

He used the wrong characters for hurt but Yixing understood the general meaning behind it and flicked his tail out to test its mobility. The ache there was like a bruise with how its prolonged but slowly fading pain waned after a few ripples. He still didn't quite trust Sehun but through the thought of Yixing deserving any of the pain he received, it was easy to relent against his tenseness and swim up to the top of the tank.

Yixing's lungs went into shock as he gasped for breath and his arms limply held onto the edge of the container, he watched Sehun move around and disappear out of the room for a minute before he reappeared on a small balcony that was half a metre from the edge of the pool. He placed the plate at the edge before stepping back to sit down and watch Yixing, once he had cut the ties on the half-siren's arms.

The elder smelt the food thoroughly prior to putting any of it in his mouth to see if anything seemed off. Then when he did let himself eat, he scarfed the entire plate as quickly as it had been put down in front of him. He felt starved with his stomach cramping and the painful clenches around the food, the helping Sehun had given him barely touched the sides of his stomach but he appreciated the gesture more than he could show.

He watched the young dragon from the waterline and was soothed to see that he’d brought a book to read with him, he didn’t have to spark up a conversation as the other brought him some company. While he didn’t fill the hole in Yixing’s chest, he would be incapable of that, and yet the sound of pages turning and breathing were enough to make him feel that little bit less alone.

v.

 

The first glimpse of Yifan that Yixing got was when the dragon’s mother came to check on the system that kept Yixing’s water fresh enough to not be a hazard to any of the other guests in the house, however, he was ignored entirely by his ex-boyfriend. Yifan didn’t look at him and Yixing couldn’t decipher whether it was through shame, guilt or hurt. Yixing was half convinced that it was a volatile mix of all three that he had caused the other to feel.

That didn’t stop him, though, from watching Yifan with the sharpest eyes he could give to take in everything about the elder and quell his concern for his well-being since their breakup had taken place. Yixing hated that Yifan appeared haggard and worn down, his hair framed his face dully and is his clothes didn’t fit him as well as Yixing could recall. He resisted the urge to reach out for Yifan through the glass, to draw him in closer and convince him to take him away from the tank, the house and the other dragons.

The dragon clan came first before everything for all of the fiery creatures and Yixing could fully understand why but there was a small part of Yixing that did wish that Yifan would choose him.

He registered swiftly that Yifan wouldn’t acknowledge him and from that he allowed himself to indulge in idle chatter with Sehun while he ate what the younger dragon brought for him to dispel the feeling of hurt for a short while. The young dragon grew more and more attentive and alert whenever they met, the food portions also grew and Yixing began to feel a little more satisfied.

Nevertheless, Sehun always had to leave.

Yixing had exhausted every interesting avenue he could possibly take to cure his boredom in his confines before he attempted to sing. He rarely was able to do so in such a large body of water—most bodies of water were bigger than his bath—and he had to admit to himself that he adored the contained freedom that he had to explore the new parts of himself.

The half-siren focused on what his mother had taught him, channelling her voice from his younger years in his head and following through with whatever she said. He could hear everything clearly in his mind and when he sang, he felt the pendant around his neck tremor with the noises it hadn’t heard in the years since Yixing’s mother’s death. Yixing tried his hardest to get one of the songs perfect and was relieved knowing that he hadn’t ever been taught to sing out publicly to anybody; his parents were the only ones who could ever hear him when he was younger.

On the third cycle of the playthroughs, the ground floor door opened with a slam against the back wall and Yixing could see a seething Yifan on the other side of the glass. His eyes were lined with purple, his hair really was all over the place and Yixing could see the comfortable fabric of his night clothes.

“What are you playing at?” Yifan glared down at him from through the glass.

Yixing shrugged, his innocence displayed itself as he tilted his head to the side to put his point across. Yifan moved closer until he was very much in line with the younger in the tank he had been told to call home.

“All that singing really needs to stop, Yixing. I am two floors above this place and I can still hear you lamenting from there, so please be quiet if you don’t one of the more angry dragons on your back,” Yifan explained and Yixing wasn’t one for truly shocking revelations but his heart raced all the same.

“You can hear me?” Yixing's voice sounded a little distorted from the water but Yifan could clearly understand him.

"Yes, you woke me up. What if it wasn't me that had heard you?" Yifan hissed to him and Yixing's stomach dropped down.

"You can hear me singing?" Yixing's question was nothing like a question at all, it was more like a statement of disbelief.

"Yes, of course, I can," Yifan growled to him. "I wouldn't be here otherwise."

"Nobody should be able to hear me sing"—unless they loved me enough—"you shouldn't be able to hear me."

"Well, I can."

Yixing was certain that if he could cry under the water, he most certainly would have because those words cut into him with a sharp blade. He recoiled from where he had drifted towards Yifan on the other side of the glass. He was frightened of the fact that he hadn't considered whether or not Yifan would have heard him. His mother had only taught him to call for the people who loved him.

"You're the only one," Yixing muttered and that time, Yifan's head was the one tilted to the side.

"So you were luring me?" Yifan gasped and Yixing's eyes widened.

"No," his vehement denial came out in a rush, "I was never taught how to. That's only something that can be taught, you're not born a siren who can sing. Everything a siren knows, other than swimming and breathing underwater, is nurtured and I have never had that. You know my past."

"I didn't even know you were a siren, how could I possibly know your past?" Yifan all but spat out at him, Yixing flinched from the words but he could feel that the hurt anger still swirled beneath Yifan's every inch of skin.

"Half-siren," Yixing corrected so quietly that he couldn't even hear it himself.

Yifan ran a hand through his hair, "Please stop doing it, it drives me insane."

"But I have nothing else to do," Yixing pleaded. "I only have my songs. Please Yifan, don't take them from me."

"You took everything from me," Yifan bit back like a sharp viper, "I can't believe you."

"I didn't mean it," Yixing cried out as he approached Yifan again, his palms flat on the glass. "I didn't want to keep it from you."

"Then why didn't you tell me?" The dragon seethed, his chest vibrated visibly under his night shirt and Yixing wished to stroke it until the tremors stopped. "You could have told me. I, unknowingly, gave you so many chances to tell me."

"I knew you would have left me if I told you," air rushed out Yixing's mouth in bubbles rising up and Yifan paced up and down in front of him. He looked just as utterly wrecked as Yixing felt on the inside, and all Yixing still wanted to do was touch his face and tell him that everything was going to be okay between them. Despite knowing it probably wouldn't ever be. "Is is so bad that I wanted to be happy? I wanted to make you happy, too."

"And look how well you did that," Yifan fumed, "with all your lying."

"I didn't mean it."

"If you didn't mean that then what else didn't you mean? Because you seemed committed to your lie until the very end."

"Don't twist this," Yixing whimpered.

"You played me. I put everything on the line by revealing that I was a dragon to you, you made me believe that you—who I thought was a human—could mean that."

"I'm so sorry." Yixing's fists curled up on the glass like he could grab at Yifan. "I really am so sorry. I wish I had told you, I really do, but would you have stayed if I did reveal this to you?"

"I don't know because you didn't believe in me enough to even let me try." Yifan levelled Yixing with a wired look, it burrowed right through Yixing's head and the half-siren crumbled weakly. "You never even gave me a chance. What if I"—Yifan took a breath—"what if I could have loved you in spite of all of this? You never let me try for you. And now I've had my heart broken because you didn't want to believe that I could be different."

Yixing's eyes fell down to Yifan's feet, he didn't want to watch as the dragon's lip trembled and eyes flooded in with tears. He didn't even look as Yifan left and Yixing wished so hard that he could cry. He had so much built up within him and he felt lost within the sea of the emotion that smothered him.

His hands beat against the glass of the tank, it echoed around the room until he stopped when his hands hurt. Silence crushed against him as the water felt like heavy cement around him and he shot straight up to the surface as fast as he could.

When air gushed into his lungs through his mouth, a dry sob erupted out of him and he clutched the edge of the tank as hard as he possibly could. His head bowed down limply, he wanted to scream and he wanted to claw his way out of the tank to chase after Yifan. He wished to beg for his forgiveness and tell him that he'd done it because he loved him more than anything and that Yifan's heart meant the world to Yixing. He felt disconnected from himself because he didn't.

Yixing hated how close Yifan was, how he could sometimes see him and he couldn't talk to him, and he couldn't reach out for him, and he couldn't touch him. Yifan was suddenly unattainable for him. Yixing had never been so close and yet so far from happiness before in his life.

 

vi.

 

Yifan wasn't supposed to have seen it, the image of Sehun creeping into the imprisonment room with a decent sized dish in his hands as the night drew in, he guessed. The guards had let Sehun pass without a concerned blink, which all but baffled Yifan. Yixing wasn't supposed to have visitors, nor was he supposed to eat anything but the food he was given in the middle of the day. The dragon ignored the part of himself that resounded relief through his veins over the thought that Yixing wouldn't starve. The love and concern with him wouldn't shut off no matter how strongly he was supposed to feel his instinctive hatred for what Yixing was; six years of an almost perfect relationship had forged those feelings and burned them deep into his heart.

The fact he shouldn't have seen Sehun didn't stop him from moving to the floor above and watching the Korean from a one-way mirror. The height and privacy gave Yifan the advantage, not to mention the fact that there were no guards to keep anybody from the window and Yifan could sate his curiosity. He hadn't seen Yixing since the night he'd heard the siren sing despite Yixing continuing to hum inside his head on every night since.

He observed how Yixing's head turned as he heard the door of the mezzanine open, how the siren swam up instantly at the sight of Sehun and how he ate from Sehun's hand willingly. The tableau, as unfamiliar to Yifan as it looked, showed how Yixing trusted the younger dragon.

Evidently, Sehun had done such a thing for Yixing before.

Yifan watched on, still. He could see the way Sehun would speak with an almost fond look on his face, like his affection for Yixing could see deeper than the skin he was in and Yifan, for the first time, let himself feel the guilt he had pushed away since he had been told of Yixing's arrival at the house. Yifan let himself look at Yixing's side profile, he bit his lip and found his finger tracing over the shape of his face on the window glass. The frown when he saw how prominent Yixing's cheekbones were was instant. It reminded him of when they were younger and Yixing's father had just died. Yixing hadn't told Yifan that his only remaining parent was gone until Yifan saw how sick Yixing looked. His skin had looked more akin to a shade of matte green than a pale golden tone, his eyes had sunken in and his body seemed to have let the healthy fat slip off into thin air.

However, Yixing looked worse than that while he was in that tank.

Yifan's eyes moved down, his finger too, and he could almost count Yixing's every rib and the nodules of his spinal column. His tail didn't shimmer like fish scales, it was covered in a pasty film that made what should have been a seafoam green or shade of wintergreen mint look like it was smeared with mud. He was sure that was a sign of bad health and Yifan wondered if Sehun's food gifts to the siren were because of how out of sorts Yixing appeared in the pool. Exhausted and depleted were adjectives that popped into Yifan's mind, it reminded him of how little reaction Yixing gave to everything his family did and how he didn't fight back once to them. The only time Yixing had looked even slightly animated was in their confrontation the night before and that was nothing like the Yixing he knew.

The younger would always stand his ground and be stubborn until his tongue ached from getting his point across, it was so out of character for him to resign himself to one end of the tank or to flinch if Sehun so much as touched his hair.

Yifan longed to know what they were talking about; if it was about Yixing's well-being, if Sehun was talking about that human Chinese boy who was in one of his classes or if they were talking about Yifan himself. Yixing was smiling gently, the kind he gave to their neighbour's children that were filled with soft admiration but tinged slightly with longing. Yifan felt lost as if he had lost every single positive right to approach his ex-boyfriend, no matter how put off he was by his aquatic form.

The dragon could only watch their exchanges from his perch and long for a time when he could roll over in his bed and find the solid and beautiful body beside his at night.

 

vii.

 

Yifan watched them from his window every night for the following week. He observed how Yixing looked, how he was slowly but surely filling out around his ribs and how his psoas muscles appeared to define themselves under his skin as his tail strengthened. Yifan had even found himself watching how the younger's body appeared to fit the siren form perfectly.

Yixing's spine curved impeccably into his tail, his abdominal muscles kept his balance at the top of his proportionally large monofin and his skin was a beautiful opal kind of shade that changed subtly under the lighting of the room whenever he moved. Yifan discovered that he actually liked watching how Yixing moved around the cramped tank, it was as if his whole body adjusted to every ripple in the water like they were connected and Yifan hadn't seen Yixing ever be so natural in his demeanour. It was like he'd tapped into a primal part of his brain that made him fit with the water and move in conjunction with it until they were a seamless entity.

Yifan wanted to reach out and touch Yixing more each time, he grew ever more tortured through the night by the siren's song filling his ears and mind — a yearning tune of loneliness — and the lack of body lying beside his own. He longed for Yixing. His body itched for the other male. His sanity clawed to go back in time to before he knew about Yixing. His lips wished for Yixing's warmth to spread among them.

There was still the thick resentment within him towards the siren, it was the kind of dislike that was nurtured into him and that wasn't something that would slip anytime soon. There were no two ways about how he could feel as a dragon, a pureblood at that, and there was nothing he was supposed to do against that. He was not supposed to be in love with a siren. He was not supposed to want a siren. 

His heart should not have wanted to change into his dragon form and curl around the tank like a protective barrier for Yixing against his own family. 

His head, the most torn part of him, was divided straight down the middle. One-half told him that he should side with his family but there was a never silent part of him that told him that his connection to Yixing would never seize.

Yifan, to a degree, needed Yixing as much as he needed his family. As much as he needed himself in some cases.

Before he had found out about the necklace, he would have easily chosen Yixing over anything in the world and had been certain that they were destined for one another.

But as perpendicular lines met and divided, they let their romance run a course they didn't control and Yifan felt the genuine terror that there was a large chance they would never meet like that again. 

All Yifan had felt was the betrayal and hurt anybody would when he had found out the other's secret. He didn't feel necessarily feel repulsed by the younger's form or his heritage. Even though he definitely didn't favour it. It leant towards the idea that he wasn't enough to Yixing to be told about what he was and he had wanted to think that Yixing was selfish.

However, he knew that if Yixing hadn't lied then they would not have had their time together and he didn't want to lose that between the two of them. Much like Yixing had told him the night Yifan had visited him. The dragon could almost see why Yixing would have lied the more he thought over Yixing's words. He just didn't know if he would have done the same in the beginning if their roles had been reversed. It made him consider how much Yixing must have adored him from the initial stages of their relationship.

Nothing made sense to Yifan. He couldn't decide if Yixing holding his tongue over the matter was a sign of love or if it was a sign that Yifan wasn't good enough. 

Yifan, realising the dangerous territory of his thoughts, stepped back from the window with a shake of his head.

He moved from the glass having realised that Sehun had left Yixing's room and there was a chilling moment when Yifan turned his head to see his younger cousin at the end of the hallway gripping practically clean the plate to his chest. Sehun appeared startled by the fact that he'd been seen and a little like he was surprised to see that Yifan was there in the first place.

"Ge," the Korean mumbled. "I can—"

"I don't need you to explain," Yifan assured him as gently as he could, he wasn't angry at Sehun. The young dragon had technically done nothing wrong.

"Okay."

Sehun twisted around to leave in an almost scurrying escape but when Yifan caught his arm in a firm grip the younger looked terrified by the action and Yifan ignored that in lieu of speaking.

"How can you not hate him?" Yifan whispered and Sehun's entire countenance shifted so something softer under Yifan's hand.

"He's still the same person as before," he shrugged and Yifan's touch on him loosened instantly allowing Sehun to shrug the grip off and be on his way down the corridor again. He turned back to regard Yifan again once he was at the end of the hallway. “He’s still the Yixing we all liked. He’s always been what he is and even if we didn’t know, we still adored him. We still loved him.”

Yifan stared after him for a few moments in something akin to awe. He hadn't ever quite considered that point of view before, nor had he even allowed himself to think that Yixing was actually no different to how he had been before. He merely occupied an altered body. He wondered how such a young dragon could think with that kind of clarity to trust character over form.

The dragon walked back to look out at the tank again and observed how Yixing settled on the floor, his eyes were downcast as he began to softly sing and Yifan's ears picked it up easily. He stayed and watched, he leant forward on the glass with his forehead pressed easily onto it and there was a startling moment when Yixing turned around to look up at the window as if he could see Yifan stood there.

He slipped away as Yixing's eyes did and left the hallway with Sehun's words ringing in time with the song.

 

viii.

 

The black dragon didn't visit the window for a few days, but felt the heavy weight of Sehun's eyes on him during the times they were within viewing distance of each other and there was nothing he could do to avoid it. The younger dragon had inherited the formidable glare that the Wu clan was renowned for and Yifan had almost never been on the receiving end of one having been raised as his parents' heir. 

That unwavering silent pressure from Sehun had him stood precariously at the end of the hallway that kept the door that led to Yixing, he watched the guards and noted how differently things had panned out since his outburst towards the younger and his song a few weeks before. He took small steps to bring himself in line with the guards and they immediately let him into the corridor. As the door for Yixing's large room opened up, he heard sharp splashes of water and then gentle lapping as everything calmed.

"You're early," a small voice whispered and Yifan held his breath, images of numerous nights watching the stars through a vast bedroom window and the matching feeling of that voice lacing into his mind from beside his ear replayed in his head.

Yixing's head popped up from the water and his eyes rounded in utter shock. Yifan's heart raced as he awaited the other's response until he came to the realisation that Yixing wasn't going to make the first move, he was just as thrown over the situation as Yifan was.

The dragon stepped forward until they were barely a metre apart and Yixing's eyes watched him from the weakly illuminated pool. Yifan didn't have anything to give him, nor did he have something specific to say. He felt blinded by everything.

"Would you like to get out of the water?" His voice was as hushed as Yixing's had been and the siren's head tilted. Yifan was certain that neither of them had expected him to say that.

Yixing bit his lip, "Can I?"

"If you'd like to." Yifan nodded, his schooled expression gave nothing away as he tried to suppress his inner turmoil. "I won't stop you if you do."

Yixing's hands held onto the bottom of the ledge as he pulled himself up. Yifan watched how his body moved and undulated as he did so, the mouthwatering reaction was nothing of what he needed to have a conversation with his ex-boyfriend. Yixing was on two legs in almost no time at all as he shied away timidly to shelter his body from Yifan's eyes. The dragon looked away in a flash as it was no longer his privilege to see Yixing's fleshy splendour.

The silence that edged over them was muted and hollow, there were so many unsaid things and so actions that weren't complete that Yifan felt as if there was a swarm of bees around their heads in the cold room. He didn't know what to say as he sat down on the floor and Yixing did the same with his legs curled up in front of his body half a foot in front of him.

It was impulsive, his mind worked overtime to decipher why he had the urged to carry forth with the action he'd silently been craving for weeks but that didn't stop him from leaning towards the siren and capturing their lips into a natural lock. Yixing didn't respond per se, he merely opened his mouth up without argument. His tongue didn't lash at Yifan's like it used to, it stayed limp where it was in waiting for Yifan's tongue to dance around it. To draw a reaction, Yifan lifted his hand to the nape of the siren's neck and didn't feel any of the pleasured shuddering that he was used to when he had done it previously.

He pushed harder, a small amount of frustration curling up within him and it snowballed until it filled his stomach, and yet Yixing didn't seem to want to push him away at any point. Yixing allowed himself to be manhandled by Yifan; he did not whine, he did not shiver and he did not moan. Worst of all, he did not respond. He merely allowed things to continue.

As hungry and thirsty as he was for the taste of Yixing, Yifan was not one to take such things if his partner was not willing.

He pulled back and found Yixing's eyes staring dully at an unknown spot between them.

"Why didn't you push me away if you didn't want me to do that?" Yifan questioned, the annoyance bubbled up out of his stomach and down into his arms until it seeped into his hands. "Why didn't you fight back?"

Yixing's eyes didn't leave their unfocused state as he spoke, "I am your prisoner, I shouldn't fight back if I don't want to be punished for it."

Yifan thought he was going to be sick. Every word dripped with a despondent and devoid tone that stuck like pins into Yifan's heart as his mind ran freely with thoughts of how far Yixing would let him go under the guise of prisoner and keeper. A fury sparked up within him, fuelled by his already present frustration and it spoke with his mouth.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" He hissed on the younger's lips. "Why would you do that to yourself? What if it wasn't me? What if it was somebody who wouldn't stop—"

Yixing let his focus fall to his own lap rather than an area of nothing between them. "I don't know."

Yifan's head fell forward, his hair brushed against the other's shoulder, still, he didn't flinch away from the movement.

"You know I would never do a thing unless you told me I could. Your consent is everything to me," Yifan muttered. "You know that."

"What does that mean?"

That was an ambiguous word and Yifan didn't quite know how to answer. His counter could never cover everything he wanted to say and his thoughts were in numerous different places all at once.

"It means I'm still figuring it all out," he admitted and Yixing let out a long breath. "I'm trying to figure everything out."

Yifan's lips pressed to the younger's shoulder and he felt the muscle quiver, the exact response he had wanted and Yixing's entire body seemed to relax as Yifan's mouth crept upwards towards his jaw and the sensitive skin that lined it. The smaller man gently lifted his hands up to rest on Yifan's shoulders, the touch was light and hesitant in such a way that it felt like it was the first time they were discovering each other. 

Yifan's lips slipped around Yixing's chin and crept up directly below his right ear, he let his breath fan over the fleshy lobe ahead of taking it tenderly betwixt his teeth and tugging it. Yixing tasted the same as he remembered. He released it in favour of slipping back over to where Yixing's mouth hung somewhat agape like he was waiting for Yifan to reclaim his lips although Yifan did nothing other than wait. He blinked slowly, his eyes focused on Yixing's closed ones.

The younger's breath puffed hotly between them, colliding and mingling in with the elder's before his lips moved to formulate a quiet word, "Yes."

Yifan closed the distance between them and allowed himself to sate the desire to kiss the other after the torturous time he'd spent without it. Yixing's mouth was not only compliant; his tongue wrapped around Yifan's the instant it passed in to swipe teasingly at the roof of his mouth, Yifan's nose could pick out Yixing's scent beneath the small streams of water that were dripping down from his hair onto his face and he could feel the dragon senses within him shiver in delight at being so close to Yixing again.

Yixing's slender hands moved across Yifan's shoulders and slipped up his neck to hold powerfully at his nape like he was trying to clutch Yifan closer. In instinctive retaliation, Yifan's hand edged up to seize the other's jaw as softly as he could in the moment. The siren shuddered and his body shifted him to be closer to Yifan than it had been while his confidence in Yifan regrew steadily. There was more purpose in his faintly calloused fingertips as they ran through the dragon's hair with one of the fingers resting upon the scar Yifan had buried in his hair on the left side of his head. That area of skin with its pinkness and tender feeling had always been sensitive for Yifan whenever Yixing's fingers grazed it, his clipped nails ran over it and that had Yifan's body shuddering as Yixing's wet body began to press at his clothed one.

Their kisses were unhurried despite the high chances of them being caught together, their savouring of one another fed their basic instincts to compress against one another. Yixing was the first to cave to that need as he began to tug Yifan's upper half with him as he laid back on the floor. Yifan was on his knees over Yixing with the siren's bare thighs framing his hips and he had to pull away from the kiss to take in the sight of the younger beneath him. His hands and mouth wanted to roam everywhere and tread the paths they had taken thousands of times before; it reminded him of the nights where he'd worship Yixing with every ounce of love that he could.

Visions of Yixing sat up against the headboard and holding it with his hand while the other was buried in Yifan's hair as the dragon pleasured him with his mouth sprung up in his mind. He knew it was wrong to assume that Yixing would want that again, or that he would even give permission for it to him again, but everything from the way Yixing had positioned them to how he was touching Yifan's neck and how he was drawing the scent of Yifan in through his nose and out in a shaky breath told Yifan that he could have free reign like he had before.

Yixing's lips crawled from Yifan's face to where his jaw hit its sharp edge, he took the earlobe in his teeth, he flicked his tongue against it and Yifan's eyes fell closed as the smaller began to nibble and lap at the small fleshy chunk. Yixing's hands crept down his body to play with the bottom hem of his shirt, his fingertips cautiously slithered beneath the material to press numerous fleeting impressions on Yifan's stomach and up around to his hips. There was nothing that could have stopped him from relishing in that touch, not when Yixing's nails dug into the muscles there to join their pelvises and Yifan's head dipped to nuzzle into the side of Yixing's neck that smelt so strongly of everything cool and crisp, much like their home in the mountains.

Yifan withdrew for a minute to tug his shirt off over his head and he observed how Yixing's eyes levelled with him prior to running down his body and his plump mouth latched onto the collarbones that stood out in relief to Yifan's chest. His mouth was somewhat worshipping and Yifan's hands immediately delved in to return the gesture by feeling up from Yixing's stomach up to his chest to massage over his skin. The motions of touching Yixing were so easy to follow but the reactions were what Yifan lived for, he could surround himself in the way Yixing's body bent upwards into his and how his eyes lidded themselves in appreciation.

It all reminded Yifan of the times he'd given himself up completely to the other, how they were seemingly bonded by something that ran in sparking electromagnetic waves of emotion and it had them bound together in ways Yifan could not completely comprehend.

Yixing's mouth moved off his chest and met his neck in appreciative kisses, Yifan's body crumbled a little to surround the other and feel everything he could. The younger's hands moved to the front of where Yifan's jeans were done up and his thumb flicked over the button a few times before it popped open and his fingers threaded to pull down the zipper. Yifan lifted his hips up as a sign of consent and to give Yixing ease of access to push them down.

Yifan couldn't quite believe that Yixing still wanted him and that kissing was all it really took to lead them to that point, he was in awe of Yixing and the feelings inside of him that were triggered by that as a consequence. He would never have known the thrills of touching and loving Yixing if the younger hadn't kept his secret and Yifan could see that blindingly clear in that very moment.

Much like Sehun had said, Yixing was still the same person as he was before. Every kind, gentle and loving action he'd ever pursued was real and every part of him that Yifan had slipped so easily into love with still existed. Yixing was Yixing.

"Yifan," Yixing's voice broke his thoughts and he found himself smiling into the other's skin as the sound of his name filled the air.

There was an unasked question there, it was subtle but Yifan knew it all too well after years of hearing it. Three of his fingers fed into Yixing's waiting mouth while the digits of his other hand rubbed up the underside of Yixing's hardening member until his fingers were coated with saliva and Yixing's body was stimulated enough that he began to sigh at Yifan's every touch. He trailed his fluid covered fingers down the bare flesh of Yixing's body, collecting more fluid from the droplets of water that still lingered on Yixing's skin and edging down between his legs until Yifan had to shuffle away from Yixing's upper half. The smaller male made a noise of disapproval as he did so and Yifan's hand stopped where it was positioned on the edge of Yixing's rim.

"Do you want to stop?" Yifan whispered. He watched Yixing mull over the question with a frown until he sat up and shook his head.

"Please don't stop, Fan, I've miss—," Yixing stopped himself, took a deep breath ahead of lying back down on the floor. "Let me have this."

Yifan watched the other for a few exhales before pressing two of his fingers directly into Yixing's body to take time to observe him fully, the younger relaxed instantly for Yifan's fingers to be able to move around and coat his inner walls in the spittle lubricant, he fit his third finger in as soon as Yixing's body allowed for him to push it in to rub yet more of the saliva into his body.

For dragons, sex got, quite literally, heated. Their chests radiated hot temperatures when their hearts raced with anticipation and arousal, it was never enough to burn a partner and Yixing had often crooned about how much he liked the feeling in the past but Yifan knew he needed to be careful. It would have been easy to grow overly excited at the prospect of touching the other again, especially given that his instincts seemed to centre around Yixing still. 

He could feel the pit grow and try to claw its way up. They rarely kissed during sex, as Yifan’s chest couldn’t always contain the fieriness and had, at times, burned Yixing’s tongue when flames bit up into his throat and mouth. Yifan calmed his heartbeat to the best of his ability and the heat returned back to its gentle hum instead of the roaring flame.

Yifan spat on his own hand a few times in preparation for stroking his own cock to ready himself to press into Yixing's body. Once he was prepared himself, he could slide in with a frictions that held a little more resistance than if they were to use lube but Yixing's body reacted in favour of the sensations as he muttered out mentions of how he could feel Yifan in a more raw sense than he usually would.

Yixing's necklace fell from where it had been resting on his chest when he arched his back to press his hips down on Yifan's, his body was ready for Yifan to draw out of again almost instantly and Yifan could feel the unbarred flesh connecting with his member as he gradually began to thrust. Yixing's reaction was one of satisfaction with his lip drawn in to be bitten into, his eyes closed and his hands curled up on Yifan's shoulders to align their chests. One of the younger's legs hooked up onto Yifan's hip to draw him further in as their hips rolled into one another.

"Harder," Yixing muttered, the H was drawn out and the D caught on his tongue but Yifan couldn't avoid how pleasure-laden the word sounded to his ears. "Please, harder."

Yifan shifted them up to a shallow angle to enable more leverage for more forceful thrusts, Yixing pushed Yifan up higher and used one of his own arms on the ground to hold himself up as Yifan's focus was on giving Yixing the pleasure he had been hunting. Yifan could see the familiar appearance of Yixing's face as the stimulation on his prostate began to build up and allow pleasure to mount within him.

"Harder," Yixing repeated again, his lower lip trembling as his incisors tried to catch it again. "Faster. Please, both."

The dragon hooked one hand around his shoulder once he had dragged his nails up his spine and used the other to hold the Yixing's hip tightly, only then did he allow an increase of speed and more force into his thrusts. Yixing's head was thrown back as he moved in reprisal to Yifan's hips, only serving for things to unfold with more momentum whilst they continued. Yixing's moans were never loud, he was the kind of person who only released whimpers and deep, long and stuttered expires but even those sounds were enough to fill the large room. They echoed right in through Yifan's bones and had him gripping tautly to Yixing's body as he tried to concentrate on making the other feel all the pleasure he craved.

A loud clattering in the hallway had Yifan freezing up and clutching Yixing instantly to his chest, he could hear the other's heart racing and Yifan's hands tucked Yixing's head into the side of his neck. He listened out to see if there would be any more noise outside to indicate to somebody entering and Yifan found himself feeling somewhat fearful for Yixing. He knew the reputation for sirens was that they were lustful creatures that could pull anybody into their trap and Yifan was certain that his family would believe that Yixing had caught him in one of his lecherous spells. He would not receive any of the blame despite being the initiator of the first movement. The half-siren would receive the unjust punishment. Every part of Yifan's body called for him to protect the person he had shielded into his body and that hurtling sensation to keep Yixing close was all he needed to discover to find the answer he had been searching for.

With the only sound surrounding them being Yixing's heartbeat, Yifan let the younger move away; he took in the shocked, wide-eyed expression the smaller male wore, the surprise that Yifan had acted to physically shield Yixing from any one of his kinsmen evident on his face. The dragon lifted his hand to cover over Yixing's sternum to feel his heart beating rapidly beneath his palm and he withdrew it quietly. Yixing did the same but on Yifan's chest with his fingers trembling and moving unsteadily to feel over the more steadily thumping muscle. The longer his hand stayed there the less control the dragon had over the heat within him.

While he kept his hand in place on Yifan's simmering chest, Yixing began to rock his hips again in swirling grinds on Yifan's lap. His pink lips quirked up as he felt Yifan's heart rush its pounds under his actions and Yifan could see that Yixing finally felt what he did to him with the heat increasing at an uncontrollable rate. The smaller shifted them until Yifan was flat out on his back with Yixing completely on top of him who had his knees either side of the elder's hips. Yixing used the position to kiss up and down Yifan's throat while he circled his hips enough to make Yifan groan loud enough that he bit the insides of his cheeks to keep his mouth clenched shut.

The feeling of Yixing's rear clenching around him so pleasantly had Yifan closing his eyelids slipping shut while his knees rose up to push back into Yixing's small undulations, he could feel Yixing's hot, almost damp breath on his neck and couldn't help his own inwardly flaming chest heaved as the feelings of pleasure rushed through him. While they weren't a couple that had sex too often, the weeks in which Yifan had gone without Yixing had been the longest period of time he had gone without intimacy since they began their relationship many years prior.

When Yifan came, it shot into Yixing in ropes of fluid heat that seemed to drain the fire from his upper body and the younger whimpered as it filled him, his own orgasm wasn't yet there and Yifan tried to maintain his presence within Yixing to stimulate his prostate enough to sustain the rising pressure from that area of the younger's body and the both of them reached between their torsos to rub Yixing to completion; Yixing's hand on top of Yifan's.

Yixing's orgasm happened with a stammered choke then his body went lax on top of Yifan's as the spurts of cum continued to flow out and all Yifan could sense was Yixing's insides tensing wonderfully around him while he thrust gently into his own cum. The dragon only pulled out when Yixing's orgasm subsided to nothing but exhausted puffs of air and lips ghosting against his neck.

Luxuriating in the moment was all that Yifan could think about as Yixing practically nuzzled against his neck like he always did after their most visceral of instances and all Yifan could think about was if he'd held his anger and let Yixing explain himself they wouldn't be in that situation. Yifan kissed Yixing's head in a silent apology that Yixing probably wouldn't be able to sense but that didn't stop him from doing it anyway.

A quiet question filled the minimal space between them that had Yifan's grip tightening on him, "What happens now?"

"I don't know," the confession was simple to make but hard to swallow as he rested his nose in Yixing's still wet locks.

"Okay," Yixing deflated in his arms once more, Yifan's mood and heart going with him.

He wished he could say that he was going to take Yixing away, that they could remain holed up in the side of their mountain and be just like they used to be. His instincts still wanted to shift into his beastly form and curl up around Yixing's tank to guard him.

It said a lot that even his inner creature still treasured Yixing as it had done before, no matter whether or not he was a siren. Or half-siren.

Unwillingly, Yifan pried Yixing away from his chest and stood up to redress, grimacing slightly at the dampness as he pulled his jeans back up.

"Please don't leave me," Yixing's voice susurrated half brokenly from where he stared at Yifan on the floor, almost like a mirror to when Yifan had left him in their home. Only the pendant hung freely from Yixing's neck that time. Yifan could see the panic arising in Yixing's gaze and that led to him move towards the younger, crouching to be in line with the other's face where Yifan gently brushed from Yixing's temple to his cheekbone with his thumb then down to his lips. He pulled the plump flesh down a little, released it and kissed it upon its resettlement under his upper lip. Yixing's mouth parted half an inch, Yifan's tongue peaked between the separated lips prior to pulling away again.

"I have to go, I can't stay in here with you for much longer," Yifan admitted with a tone that was full of regret. "I've got to go back but I promise I'll come and see you again tomorrow night after Sehun comes. You should really get back into the water; I don't want there to be any reason for anything to happen to you while I'm gone."

Yixing crawled back to where the balcony ended and the tank began, Yifan helped him over the barrier and he watched as Yixing's body glistened and shimmered to form up his splendorous tail under the water. Yifan could see shadowed lines form up on Yixing's neck as his gills appeared and found himself not finding the sight of Yixing like that as repulsive as he thought he would. Instead, he could see the way his skin tinged with oceanic colours to highlight his every feature, his neck appeared more slender as the slits framed it and his tail was a reflective wonder within itself. He'd spent days watching Yixing in his aquatic form, it wasn't a shock to see him like that but the distance he'd had before didn't do the younger justice.

"Do you promise?" Yixing whispered out of his quivering lips and Yifan's heart broke at the insinuation that Yixing no longer trusted him but he understood why.

"On my wings."

When the house was quiet from everything save for the deep breaths of his clan, Yifan left his bed to creep down into the basement and those guarding Yixing didn't seem to notice him walking in while they dozed off in their places at the end of one of the corridors. Each time Yifan visited the siren, his heart softened at how Yixing's smile became brighter when he first saw Yifan sneak into the room and his heart hardened as he saw Yixing's eyes dim as he told him he had to get back into the water for Yifan to leave. It hurt to see Yixing so crumpled at the mere idea of being left alone for hours on end.

The worst times were when Yifan had to follow his parents into the view Yixing from the floor entry; he could not touch, speak to or fully acknowledge the siren. Albeit, that was eased by the fact Yixing would hum one of his songs that only Yifan could hear for the whole duration of his entry and the tall dragon had to bite back a smile as he heard it reverberate in his head.

Yifan became more mystified with Yixing's aquatic form the more he saw him, which led to him often asking if he could brush his hands up Yixing's tail or feel the younger's gills under the tips of his fingers. He still wasn't quite used to it but he was sure that exposure was the only way he could adjust. Yixing, nonetheless, seemed to preen under the attention Yifan showed him. He did still shift out of Yifan's touch whenever he grazed over where the dragon knew sirens had their wings. Yixing admitted to how his wings were sensitive and that he rarely allowed them out because he'd never been taught how to fly because of how young he had been when his mother had died. They were essentially redundant but still a personal part of him. He didn't mind not seeing Yixing's wings, given the situation but Yixing had left him with the faint promise of one day.

The eighth night Yifan had with Yixing, Yifan entered the room without the younger realising and watched him playing under the water by flicking his tail and trying to catch it with his hands. Yifan decided to pull his night clothes off, climb over the barrier and lower himself deep into the water. By that time, Yixing's attention had been caught and Yifan slowly opened his eyes from where they had closed to see Yixing closely lined up with his face. Yixing's hair moved with the water, the amulet around his neck appeared to glow numerous different shades and his hands weren't wrinkled as he grabbed Yifan's wrist. The younger smiled, he beamed, at the sight of Yifan being under the water with him.

Yixing instantly started singing and swimming around Yifan as he tread water to keep himself semi-buoyant in the tank. Yifan spun around in time with Yixing and found himself adoring how happy Yixing looked to be there with him in the water. Yifan instantly realised that Yixing had always meant it whenever he said he'd be lonely in the water without Yifan there to accompany him. He guessed that sirens, like dragons, were sociable creatures and he would genuinely lonely in the water on his own.

The siren's song only became blither the longer Yifan was there and he found himself hating how quickly his lungs began to burn with the need to breathe. He took as much time as he could with exhaling to relieve some of the urgency within him, though he was swiftly defeated as he kicked up to the surface. Yixing followed him up and grinned at him directly.

Yixing wrapped his arms around Yifan's neck and drew them within a hair's breadth of one another, Yifan discovered he was not bothered by the constant brushing of scales on his bare skin as he would have anticipated and let his nose brush up against Yixing's until they were sharing lipless kisses.

"You're in the water," Yixing squealed with his tail twitching as it flicked against Yifan's legs.

Yifan nodded somewhat, "I am."

"You've never—I'm just—you've never wanted to and I can't beli—"

"I told you," Yifan murmured back as water dribbled down his face from his hair, "I'm trying."

Yixing nodded, he moved forward and kissed Yifan tenderly with a soft melodic hum in his throat. They floated there for a while, the dragon entwined with Yixing's perfectly designed tail keeping them upright and their skin pressed them up against one another.

"I wish I could take you up to bed with me, I hate sleeping alone with the idea of you being down here on your own and I'm really trying hard to work out what my parents are planning because at the minute there's nothing. I want to tell them that you wouldn't run away if you were with me but I know they don't see Yixing anymore, they only see a siren and I don't know how to fix this." Yifan's eyes fell away from where they had focused on Yixing to stare and observe how Yixing's body looked distorted by the waterline. "I'm sorry that I am putting you through this when I know you chose to not tell me because you wanted to be happy because I am what made you happy.

"I should have listened to you but all I could hear was this awful white noise when I found out and I wasn't even angry that you're a siren. I was hurt because I thought we were always honest with each other and I felt so betrayed at that moment. But underneath it all, when I saw you, like this, I thought you were still beautiful. I'm trying to not care about what you are because I know who you are and you sacrificed this incredible part of you so that we could both be happy together. And I ignored that because of a temporary feeling and I'm so sorry, baobei. I could beg for your forgiveness every second of every day until I die and that would still never be enough."

"Xiao Long," Yixing's hushed endearment across drifted the water top, his head found its place in Yifan's neck as his strong arms held fast around Yifan's torso. "Don't think like that, please. Don't be sad, this isn't your fault." Yifan felt Yixing's eyes close against his nape. "Will you let me kiss you?"

"Yes."

Yixing did kiss him and water flooded into their mouths as they lowered. Yifan felt dizzy as Yixing's tongue dominated his mouth to press the muscle almost everywhere to get a taste and Yifan's phone began to vibrate on the balcony. The alarm that meant their time was up.

Yixing pulled away with the pool fluid falling out of his mouth, his eyes curved happily at the elder until Yifan's mouth tugged into a smile as an instinctive response to the other's action.

"Make sure to shower ahead of getting back into bed and dry your hair, you'll get sick if you leave it like this," the shorter worried, threading his fingers into Yifan's locks. "Goodnight, Xiao Long."

"Goodnight, baobei." Yixing released him and Yifan began to swim away, he felt the younger's eyes burning on his back as he redressed into his dry clothes and moved to make his exit.

The siren blew him a kiss when he glanced back over his shoulder and Yifan, jokingly, caught it with his hand and pressed it to his chest. Yixing rolled his eyes but his smile was no longer happy, neither of them liked their moments of parting and Yifan hated to be the one to leave.

He slunk out of the room, he moved silently down the hallway and almost made it to the top of the stairs of the main house before he collided with somebody. His heart stopped for a split second as he dreaded who it could be, there was no other reason than being with Yixing that Yifan could be soaked from head to toe and leaving the basement.

"Ge," the voice whispered and Yifan's shoulders relaxed under his shirt. "Is he okay?"

"I think so," Yifan cleared his throat. "I don't know how much longer he can go without sunlight, though, he'll probably get sick soon."

"I thought that, too," Sehun agreed as they both made to start walking back to the stairs to head upstairs. Yifan noted the snacks in Sehun's hands and smiled when he saw them. "But there's a book in your dad's study that I picked up the other day. It has this huge section on sirens and it describes how their shiny skin stops them from needing as much sunlight, as they tend to stick to the depths of oceans when they're not, uh, luring. So I'd expect he'd be okay." 

The young dragon paused as he muttered a few things in Korean, his brain unmistakably searching for the right Chinese to use. "I haven't ever wanted to be involved in something like this, how can they keep him trapped here?"

"Some conflicts happen for so long that sometimes you forget that the 'enemy' are living, breathing beings, too," Yifan guessed with a shrug. "It's a case of us-or-them for a lot of the clan, for most dragon clans actually, and Yixing just so happened to be born one of them and we were born as one of us. None of us asked for this, nobody chose to be born into this but it's the reality of the world we live in."

"Do you think they'll hurt him?" The Korean's voice was braced and nervous, appearing to be prepared for Yifan to lash out at the idea.

Yifan looked down as they made their way to the north wing of the house, "I honestly do not know."

"What will you do if they do hurt him?"

Yifan had thought that exact thing over and over but the response had always been the same: "I think I'd protect him with my life before they could lay a finger on him." He heard a subtle gasp from Sehun, as if he was shocked by Yifan's words and the elder dragon remembered reacting similarly when he'd first thought that answer up. Not once in all his years had he expected to love and to go against his own flesh and blood for it but Yixing was different. "Yixing has become a part of my dragon's clan now. And a dragon's loyalty always lies with the clan it chooses."

 

x.

 

The tall dragon always became nervous whenever his parents called him into his father's study, especially as all they ever discussed privately was Yixing and if there was anything Yifan didn't want to hear it was the people who had raised him, accepted his sexuality and had once welcomed his boyfriend into the family like he was a son talking about Yixing as if he was something that didn't deserve to breathe.

He had sat through an hour of them discussing ways to punish Yixing for being a siren and Yifan had to bite his tongue so many times to stop defensive words from spilling out into the room. However, he knew that if he did so then Yixing would still receive the blame for 'bewitching' Yifan. Despite the fact that Yixing hadn't ever been taught to use his song for anything other than to create lullabies and express love and longing. No matter how much he wanted to flash angrily like a fire in a pan at his parents, he couldn't through fear of Yixing getting the backlash from it. 

They'd thrown numerous ideas around the room and Yifan had hated them all, great and small.

It took Sehun coming in to return some books that his parents perked up, his mother levelled Sehun with a calculating look as she leant on her hand. The matriarch was Sehun's direct aunt and had always liked Sehun favourably, that much Yifan knew.

"Now, Shixun," she began and Yifan watched closely as her eyes darkened a little, "what would be a fate worse than death to you?"

"M-me?" He stammered and all Yifan wanted to do was pull the young dragon behind him to shield him from her.

"Yes, what would it be for you?"

Sehun blinked, panicked. "Uh, lo-losing my wi-wings?"

The response was reflexive and default for most dragons; Yifan would have said the same exact thing. Any dragon—no, any being with wings—would probably respond with the same response. A set of wings weren’t only attached to the body but the soul, too. They resembled a freedom that couldn’t be felt unless a person was soaring high in the sky with the world insignificantly small below.

The room was and quiet as it could have been with the four of them when the idea of what his parents would have got from that dawned on Yifan. 

Yifan's parents turned to each other for a few minutes and that only made a thick sense of anxiety pool like syrup in his stomach. He turned to the youngest dragon and flicked his eyes from his face over to the door and the Korean deflated but took the cue, nonetheless. Sehun left the room as hastily as Yifan had ever seen somebody exit through a door before, the panic in his body showed that he’d put two and two together much like Yifan had. The slightly older dragon strained under the fear for the time that his parents had their silent conversation and something within Yifan snapped as it overwhelmed him faster than he could have thought.

"Please don't touch his wings," he pleaded and his mother's face hung shocked for a moment before her mouth pulled up into a smile. Yifan had only ever seen his mother's adoring, softer side and her kind eyes save for there was something animalistic that went beyond her dragon instincts within her darkened irises.

"You know, I actually forgot that those things had wings for a while. It's been so long since I last thought about them but I think that's actually a great idea, Fan," she nodded, her hand stretched out towards him but he didn't take it. He wanted to let the heat build up in his throat and burn her for the gesture. "A creature like that shouldn't be blessed with the power of flight."

Yifan's heart stopped in his chest as she rose up to her feet and he peeked over at his father. Please don't, his mind begged through the shock and he hoped it showed in his eyes as his voice left him.

"You know your mother is right, son," he sighed. "It made a mockery of you—of us. It needs to be punished for that."

Yifan opened his mouth, still, no words came as his fists shook, his parents rounded the table and patted his shoulder as if they were doing him a favour.

"You stay in here, okay?" His mother cooed at him and Yifan felt dizzy with a concoction of emotion, he had to sit down otherwise he knew he would shift and he didn't have Yixing or anything with his scent on to calm him down.

The dragon instinct in him told him to search through the wooden bureau next to the window and so he trailed that sense, he tore through the cabinet until he came across some fabric. He knew the shirt, it was one of his own but it had been cut with scissors and he held it to his nose. The heat that had just begun to sear in his veins was extinguished at the strong smell of Yixing and their home in the north, Yifan's hands clenched and unclenched around the material before he twisted back around to confront his parents.

Without him even realising, they had left him in the room. He instantly knew that they had been calculating how he would react to the idea of Yixing losing his wings while they had their wordless exchange, they knew how easily the rage would incapacitate him and they'd taken advantage of that. Yifan tried the door handle instantly, he pulled on it as hard as he could but it didn't budge. He banged on the metal enforced surface as hard has his body would allow. No one seemed to come for him no matter how long it took or how loudly he pounded the door. He resigned himself to sitting on the floor and leant back against the wall with his eyes flooding with fluid that showed his helplessness.

Half an hour must have passed before Yifan could hear Yixing start to sing in his head; the siren was calling for him.

He knew that Yixing was most likely doing it because he was scared—terrified—and it made Yifan feel utterly incapable. The dragon knew that changing form was pointless with the house being dragon-proofed. Though he wanted nothing more than to do that when Yixing's voice got louder in his head. His hand only held stronger to the shirt as he inhaled from it again in hopes that it would do something other than make him feel useless.

Yixing's singing had become so deafening that he didn't note that the door in the lock was sliding across, all he could hear was Yixing and only when he saw Sehun standing in front of him did he notice the opened door.

"Ge, I didn—," Sehun was cut off as Yifan sprung up and rounded the corner out of the door as fast as he could. "I didn't think they'd do anything when I said it. I-I'm so sorry."

It was next to impossible to hear anything over the noise in his head that nobody else knew existed but Yifan could make out a few words the other was saying.

"I know," Yifan assured him dismissively as they got down the first flight of stairs and tried to push their way through the people who had congregated in the hallway. Sehun’s intentions and guilt were not an immediate concern for Yifan. He was barely thinking, all he knew to do was to get to Yixing and work it all out then. He just needed to get to Yixing. "Stay near your parents and don't react to anything."

"Ge, what are you going to do?"

“Stay with your parents, okay?" Yifan sent Sehun a look that left no room for argument and the boy tarried where he was with a concerned expression thrown towards the older dragon.

Yifan pushed harder at the surrounding people to get down to the basement before more people amassed to watch whatever was happening and his nerves were trembling on their edges until he got through the door, barged his way through the last grouping of people and stood behind his parents.

He peered over their shoulders and saw two legs, naked and trembling on the floor, on the dry side of the tank's glass. The tall dragon froze where he was, he could see the way that Yixing was curled up, utterly bare and humiliated, on the floor and his dragon told him to change, to protect.

When Yifan attempted to move to advance on his parents, two sets of strong hands held onto his wrists from behind and he shot a look back over his shoulder to see two of his uncles standing with stern faces telling him not to make another move towards the half-siren. Yifan's stare shifted to frantic as he tried to pull against the vice he was in but knew he wouldn't break free.

"It's simple," he heard his mother say. "I am sure you heard it the first time. Show us your wings."

He saw the sodden mop of hair that had become overgrown since his arrival to the house, the temporary prison, remain still. Even if it was limp, Yifan felt a gentle surge of pride over Yixing's silent denial.

"Show us your wings," his father spoke.

"Yixing—" Yifan called out and the siren's head snapped up, the singing stopped and Yifan held his gaze.

"Ah, the little thing actually can move," somebody muttered over Yifan's shoulder, earning a titter of laughter from those within earshot.

"Yifan, you're here," his mother turned, her eyes softened slightly as she looked at him. It reverted back to something ruthless as she regarded Yixing again. "You see, if you loved my son like you once proclaimed, you would take his place in anything, right?" Yixing's eyes crawled to look at Yifan's mother again. "Now, would you show us your wings if we told you that we would take his wings if you didn't?"

On the spot, Yifan's heart broke. His own mother had used him as a bargaining chip against the being he loved and he pulled harder at the hands on his arms as they all saw Yixing move. It hurt more than when he'd found out about Yixing. The half-siren shuffled around to remain curled into himself except his back could be seen in its complete shaping.

"Baobei, don't—"

Some of the dragons around him gasped at the endearing name being spoken from a dragon to a siren yet that wasn't what cut Yifan's words short. Yixing's spine vibrated wildly, two stumps grew quickly first before two half diamond shapes of white feathers slid out in a cascading motion to start the formation of the wings. It was a beautiful but rottenly hollow scene. Yixing had said one day and Yifan had always imagined that to be the two of them alone at home wrapped up in each other. Not as an act of horrifically savage act of shaming.

Yixing's wings transfixed Yifan until a hand touched them, he heard the sob from where he was stood and Yifan pulled his own wrists hard. One of them broke out, shocking himself and he used it to yank the other out of the clamped hand on it. He wasted no time and purposely took advantage of his uncles' confusion to barge past his mother and slip down onto the floor with Yixing.

The siren was shaking violently, both through terror and lack of warmth, and his immediate reaction was to hold him, to gather him up in his arms and clutch him to his chest like he had the night they'd reconnected and he'd fear that they'd been caught.

"Yifan?" Yixing mumbled when the dragon touched him softly.

"I'm here," he soothed as quietly as he could while his father gaped at him from where he was upright at Yixing's side. "I'll protect you. I won't let them touch you or your wings. Put them—your wings—away, don't let them out again no matter what."

The half-siren settled on him with an expression inundated with presentiment, his whole body shook with the unrefined fear and Yifan’s palm landed on his cheek. Yixing leant into the hand there like he could ensconce himself there. The wings were fluttering like they had an anxiety of their own, he wanted to reach out and touch them, to relieve them, but he knew he didn't Yixing’s permission to feel them. Instead, he stuck with the humanoid half of Yixing. His other hand met his hair to stroke through it.

“Please, baobei, put them away. You don’t need to show them right now. You’re scared and I need you to know that I’m here to protect you.” Doubt arose on Yixing’s features, his head shook and Yifan moved closer to him to nose at his tear-streaked cheek. “I know you’re torn, I know this is scary but I need you to trust me right now. I know that right now you probably have no reason to trust me fully because all of this is my fault but I need you to trust in what I’m going to do next, okay?”

Yixing watched him for a few minutes then conceded in acceptance of the words with a nod. The white feathers disappeared, albeit reluctantly, and Yifan's heart relaxed a little. "Do not let them out. Whatever happens, don’t show them your wings again."

"Wu Yifan, how dare you?" His mother hissed in front of everybody. 

Yifan released Yixing and stood to place himself between the half-siren and the rest of the room. "I asked you not to touch his wings," Yifan's voice wasn't as whiny has he expected it to be, neither was it laced with the heartbreak he felt. It sounded rough and firm, almost like a threat. "I asked you not to touch his wings."

"Yifan—"

The slowly angering dragon ignored his mother's call. "Why would you do that to somebody? Another living being that bleeds, hurts and loves just like you do. It's Yixing."

"—he's got you under—"

"He doesn't, he can't do that stuff," Yifan fought back, his blood boiling up in through each of his veins to spread it out all over. "Wouldn't he have done something before all of this if he could? Not to mention the fact that nobody other than me here can even hear any of his songs and he doesn't use them to lure me or enchant me."

"Son," his father started and Yifan stepped back to shelter Yixing even more. "Even if he hasn't done anything to your mind, you're blatantly not thinking straight. Step aside and let us handle this."

"No," he ground his teeth, his jaw locking as a result.

"Yifan, move," his mother's heat could be felt from where he was stood a metre away from her, an indication of just how much he was infuriating her but he could feel Yixing's body shaking against his calves. The younger's terror affected him far more than his mother's anger could.

"If you want a set of wings so badly then," he yelled and the room morphed to become pin-drop silent, “just take mine."

The wrath fuelled tension ebbed away to nothing as everybody stared in utter dismay at the dragon stood in front of the quivering being. Yifan stepped towards his parents, removed his shirt and sank to his knees. His wings sprung up on their own with minimal thought as he bowed towards the matriarch and patriarch of the clan.

He cleared his throat, his anger subsiding to let anxiety seep in. "I pledge myself to take his punishment."

"Fan," his mother moved in front of him and touched his cheek; he shook the stroking fingers off easily.

"You said it yourself that if he did not give his up then you would take mine, I want you to fulfil that half of your deal," his voice retained a single tone, none of his nerves had made it to his tongue. 

"Why are you doing this?" While his mother had moved towards him, his father had continued to reside right where he was in a rooted state of disbelief.

Yifan angled his head up but didn't solidly meet anybody's eyes, "He doesn't deserve this."

"Fan," his mother's voice had reverted back to how Yifan remembered it being as a child whenever he fell over and cut his knees open.

"I don't care what he is because that isn't that there is to him. He's more than a half-siren, he's more than a half-human and he's more to me because he's the one I want to be with. If that means that I can never fly again then that's okay because I would rather stay on the ground with him than ever be alone in the sky again."

He felt a weight on his back, the feeling of flesh on his and the unmistakable sensation of tears dripping from eyelashes onto his skin. Yixing's cold body was a comfort, a solid structure of care and adoration that he was sure he'd never be able to replace in his life.

"I could never take my own child's wings," his mother uttered with her expression displaying how torn she was over the matter.

"Then please let him go," Yifan pleaded much like he had in the study. "Let us both go. We'll go back to our home and we'll never come anywhere near here again. Let me be with him and let me be happy. If you want me, your only child, to be happy then please let me take him home."

His mother appeared to be crying as she attended to Yifan's father for the ability to grant him permission with his request, the oldest of the three pureblood dragons looked around at the surrounding dragons who were waiting with bated breaths. He debated the idea numerous times over, Yifan could see his mind ticking as it chose between his ingrained hatred of sirens and his innate love for his child's happiness.

"He makes you happy?" The elder dragon asked, straining on the 'he'.

"More than anything else ever could," the younger confessed openly and his father nodded as chaos ensued around them.

Numerous dragons hissed and spat as Yifan's mother told them to leave with her fragile voice and she held Yifan's face firmly in her hands as she kissed his forehead. "I shouldn't have said I that I would hurt you, I would never do that to you. I didn't mean it."

Yifan's wings folded themselves away, which had Yixing ducking out of the way, he withdrew again from his mother's hands and picked his shirt up from the floor to pull over Yixing's head where he was, again, coiled up in a tight ball. He made sure that the younger was wrapped up in the material ahead of turning to his mother whilst he rubbed his forehead. As if to clean her kiss from the central spot.

“It doesn’t matter if you meant that or not,” Yifan addressed her evenly, "you should never have said anything at all."

“Fan, will you stay here with us if we promise to let him go?” His father proposed and Yifan

“You intended to maliciously harm another living being because of an age-old vendetta you have against his kind; you were willing to create pain without a second thought and without thinking who you’d be hurting in the process. I don’t want to be part of a clan that carries that craving for causing affliction.” Yifan’s consternation waned with each breath he took between words until he was sure of what to say next. “It seems I inherited your zeal for severing things as a punishment because I don’t see either of you worthy of my allegiance and loyalty. I am renouncing any relationship I have with you, and my heirdom, and I won’t change my mind on that for the reason that I want no part in anything like this ever again.”

“Yifan,” his mother sobbed but Yifan didn’t want to spare her another moment.

“If you want to say goodbye then do so now, considering that you’ve granted permission for both Yixing and me to leave.” His mother hauled herself towards him and wrapped her arms around his neck, she cried into his chest but he didn’t move an inch. He didn’t want to be a comfort to her. When she stepped back, his father took her place and huddled him up. Much like with his mother, he didn’t even consider reciprocating the action.

Once he had been fully released, he shifted wordlessly to give his full attention to Yixing and lifted the younger up easily, he tangled the half-siren’s legs around his waist and did the same with his arms but around his shoulders. The smaller man tucked his head into Yifan’s neck, his body immersed itself in the warmth Yifan’s body expelled and the quivering lessened considerably. The dragon carried Yixing across the room, through the recoiling and hissing crowd to make it to the stairs where they made their escape.

 

xi.

 

They didn't leave the south immediately after they left the house, they stayed in a hotel in the city while Yixing adjusted to living like a human again with his two legs and his sun-deprived skin. Yixing felt different as Yifan had guided him out of the basement, up to his bedroom and towel dried him. There were a few items of Yixing’s clothing in one of the drawers from the visits they had made previously, he had a few collared shirts and a pair of jeans that Yifan packed up for him and dressed him in while he re-established how to balance fully on his legs after weeks of disuse.

Sehun visited them for a few minutes before they left Yifan’s bedroom. Yixing had felt relief when he saw the young dragon and it was all too easy to cuddle him to show his thanks for his company across the previous weeks. The Korean, however, had broken down into a deep pool of tears as he apologised over and over for the pain he’d caused, and Yixing was lost until Yifan held them both to his chest and they welcomed the noise of his heartbeat thudding continuously on together. Yixing listened as the older dragon soothed the younger one by saying that nothing was his fault and that Sehun wasn’t at fault for anything his parents did.

Yixing hadn’t wanted to say goodbye to the Korean dragon, he had fussed to make sure that he had every possible way of contacting him imaginable and Yifan had extended the offer that Sehun was welcome to visit them whenever he wanted. The youngest of the three remained in the room as the other two left with Yixing latched onto Yifan’s side again with his weakened knees.

The sun made Yixing's skin ache when it touched it, it felt too hot and Yifan placed him in the passenger seat of his car to buckle him in while he loaded their items into the trunk. He could feel the air conditioning on his skin and relaxed into the seat when Yifan got into the driver’s side to start the engine.

Yifan had told him then that it would be better if they stayed in the south for a short while longer because Yixing’s skin would need the Vitamin D from the UVB rays of the sun. At first, Yixing hadn’t been taken with the idea of lingering around where Yifan’s family were but the dragon promised him that they could get a room with a balcony, which meant that they wouldn’t have to leave the building once for Yixing to be able to get his fill of what he required.

If anything, those few days were what Yixing needed to adjust to being out of the tank again. While he wasn’t in his own bed, he did have Yifan by his side at night and he had his full attention during the daylight hours as he strengthened up the muscles in his legs again. The sun turned his skin from a harsh pale colour to a far more natural shade of gold and Yifan didn’t fight Yixing whenever he tried to stand up on his own or walk a few laps around the room. Which shocked the other, he had half anticipated Yifan to be overbearing about the situation but the dragon had been quick to explain that he trusted that Yixing would know when to stop, and if he didn’t then Yifan would only be a few strides away from him.

By the time they were checking out of the hotel, Yixing felt far closer to Yifan than he had before and that shocked him deep within his heart because he’d always thought they were incredibly in tune everything unfolded.

The drive back was easier than Yixing had anticipated, too. Yifan offered to take him to the beach but Yixing had softly declined in favour of wanting to go home and throw himself into his bed. The elder had informed him that his design clients had been contacted prior to Yixing being taken from the house and that his reputation as a designer wouldn’t be damaged. That singular revelation had Yixing flabbergasted as he rode shotgun and pestered Yifan for hours over why he’d cancelled the bookings rather than letting them expire if he was supposed to ‘hate’ the half-siren. Withal, Yixing couldn’t keep the smile from his lips when he finally got the reply he wanted: “There are some feelings you can’t turn off, no matter what you find out about each other.”

 

xii.

 

Like with most things, the loveliest moments wore off and Yixing felt constantly confused while he was at home. Yifan, as wonderful as he had been, refused Yixing whenever the younger wanted to initiate anything physical between the two of them. Yixing would try to touch Yifan’s skin whenever he could and he was able to feel the elder heat up with dragonish delight whenever it happened but Yifan always stopped Yixing’s wandering hands in his tracks.

The younger had tried to broach the subject with him but Yifan had shut him down each time. It took Yixing getting Yifan in bed, pinning him down and kissing him until he felt a fire emerge in the back of Yifan’s throat to get his attention. When the elder had tried to pull away, Yixing had sat back up on his lap and ground his teeth in frustration. Yifan asked, half demanded, to know what was wrong with him and Yixing unloaded that he wanted to resume their intimacy again and that Yifan didn’t seem to want him so much anymore.

Moments later, they were both naked and feeling over one another’s bodies as their mouths had explored one another’s necks and chests. Yixing felt like he had hit his cloud nine when Yifan responded to everything he gave him with a loving tinge of heat up through his tongue and Yixing felt electric. The dragon had wanted him, he seemed to have craved him, and he showed that through every touch of their lips together as the day edged towards its end with a bright sunset.

He reckoned with himself that it was most likely to have just been Yifan's wariness of his weakness that he hadn't had in the time that they'd had sex while Yixing was stuck in the dragon house and that the dragon was merely being careful. Yixing found himself appreciating it because of the sentiment and because it had made Yifan seem starved of his carnal desires.

They had soon sat up for Yifan to gain more access to the sensitive skin at the back of Yixing's neck and the dragon's hands were firm, confident and refined in the way they felt up Yixing's ribs to his shoulders while they sucked marks onto one another's skin.

"I want to see them," Yifan ran his hands across Yixing's shoulder blades until they met in the middle over his spine, the touch soothed over his skin to relax the younger. "Your wings, I'd like to see them."

Yixing looked down at his boyfriend with furrowed brows, the tender touch on his bare skin still swirled around and made him want to press himself into the other, to seek some more of the safe feeling he got from the dragon.

"Really?" Yixing gnawed on his lip, as he pushed his hands into Yifan's neatly groomed hair. "I thought you wouldn't want to see them ever again, after last time."

Yifan drew Yixing even closer with their stomachs gently pressing together, "Please, just let me see them, even just for a second."

There was something in the way Yifan was looking at him, the way they were as close as they possibly could be and the way Yifan's hands were feeling for where Yixing's wings were hidden in a series of tender presses, Yixing couldn't ignore it. His boyfriend was willing to be more accepting of him, he was trying to find beauty in Yixing that he hadn't found before and it enthralled the younger. As if to coax Yixing, the elder's body grew hotter than normal and his body shuddered under Yixing's arms. Yifan's own wings appeared in a thunderous whoosh, the black scales scattered with silver stretched out widely and Yixing could feel the way they rippled up the other's back without changing the rest of his body.

Yixing drew in a breath, his boyfriend's hands soothed over him and then his body felt as though it was shimmering, the rippling feeling gave way to fluttering as the sinews of his back changed to allow the feathery appendages to appear. He felt his back grow heavier and, as if by protective instinct, Yifan's wings wrapped around them both and the elder held Yixing's body as his muscles adjusted to support his new weight and proportions.

Yifan's hands were on his spine, slowly and guardedly made their way to the bone joints that had appeared as if from nowhere, Yixing shivered at the fine touches and anticipated the other to touch the opalescent plumes but he didn't. He massaged around where Yixing's skin met the eiderdown on his back, he couldn't control the small groan as heat dispersed from his boyfriend's touches. It was a sensation he could only compare to when Yifan palmed him through his underwear, it had Yixing sighing and relaxing as though he was preparing for himself for Yifan to feel him even more.

"Is this okay?" Yifan worried and Yixing nodded while he bit back a small.

He lifted his head up to look at the concerned furrow of the other's brow that bracketed his eyes, "Yeah, you can touch them more."

The elder's palms came into contact with the pinions of the younger's wings and he quivered towards the elder with a laughed out moan, he was shocked at the electricity he felt when the other touched his wings.

"Does this feel good?" Yifan queried.

Yixing giggled as he nodded, the elder's wings moved away from around them and, as if his wings had a mind of their own, Yixing's own spread out a little further. Yifan's hands moved around to the side of the wings that was directed between them and the younger's breath changed as Yifan stretched across the top of the feathered appendages. The dragon's mouth smiled slightly as Yixing's arousal made itself known by pushing its way up between them.

"These are so beautiful," Yifan muttered, his fingers grazing against the down of Yixing's wings and the younger bit his lower lip as his lover looked over him in an awe-filled expression. "You're so beautiful like this, your wings are incredible."

The dragon didn't sound as though he was in disbelief but there was an undertone of astonishment in his words that Yixing barely registered before his wings were pressed harder against by the other's fingers and his skin pricked with delicious intent. Yixing's own hands went to the elder's scales. Yifan's reaction was much like Yixing's own as he dipped his head down and everything seemed to move slowly while they felt the texture of the other's animalistic features. The siren knew the touches were more intense for himself, his wings were a symbol of intimacy and Yifan was the person he was the most indwelt with but the dragon seemed to preen beneath his caresses and his scales shimmered black and silver in the evening's soft purple light.

Yifan's hands felt between the feathers, up the harder parts of his upper wings and tickled at the lower wisps. The only reactions Yixing could give were whimpers and muted groans, his hips rutted against where they were pressed to Yifan's body and he could only feel his arousal soar while his wings were caressed. 

The more the dragon touched him, the more everything affected Yixing and drove him crazy. It wasn't long until the way Yifan's hands felt over him was not too dissimilar from the feeling of truly having sex. He hadn't anticipated the mouthwatering sensations or the instant need to release. 

"Can I touch you?" Yifan was tentative and Yixing moved his hands shivering to his jaw, he tilted the elder to look him in the eye.

"You don't have to ask, Xiao Long," he whined.

"I do."

"You don't," Yixing assured the elder with a breathless whisper.

"Trust takes a lot of time to rebuild and I've messed everything between us that we've created so far," Yifan's lips were brushing over Yixing's, his hands massaging the younger's wings and Yixing's eyes flitted closed with a benumbed moan. "I am going to prove that I am worthy of you by doing all of this at your pace."

Yixing's heart soaked the words up, they were laden with promises that he knew the elder would be able to keep and yet his mind was focused on the speed.

"You might get brownie points if you go a little faster tonight, baobei."

Yifan appeared to relax at the endearment, the meaning behind it resonating between them both and the elder moved his fingers around where he could reach on Yixing's wings and the younger's hardness was thickening with every caress the elder was giving his appendages. The siren's eyes closed as he sighed into the other's mouth and there was nothing he wanted more than to feel Yifan's lips against his own again. It felt like it had been so long since he'd licked his way into his boyfriend's lips, a taste of spice and fire that used to comfort him so much whenever he got lonely.

"Can I kiss you?"

Yixing didn't respond but bit the other's bottom lip before teasing it with his tongue as best as he could, he kissed the elder gently with an open mouth and it took a few urging strokes to the joints on the dragon's back to have his tongue slip between Yixing's lips. The pure essence of Yifan flooded through Yixing's senses. He could feel the fire in the dragon's breath, it was like the flames of the animal in Yifan were being blown into the sirens mouth and he felt the exterior of the other heating up more than what was normal for them.

"Calm down," Yixing pulled back to whisper, the tufts of smoke-accented between them and Yifan's eyes gleamed the lava shade it did when his beast was emerging. "You'll hurt me if you get too hot."

Yifan nodded, gulping as if he was trying to swallow a small blaze and his eyes faded back to the soft brown they had once been, "You're just too beautiful, I can't stop myself but I want to worship every part of you."

As if to prove himself, the elder slipped one of his hands between their bare chests and his fingertips grazed over Yixing's naval in a hint that he wanted to touch Yixing's still growing erection. "Please do."

The dragon touched him then, his large hand covering the most part of his member and he began to massage it gently between his fingers. Yixing’s breath hitched, his fingers shook and his back arched his chest into Yifan’s to feel the heat he knew was there. With his hips tilted in such a way, Yixing could gently thrust his hips to move in and out of Yifan’s fist and he used one of his own shaking hands to guide the elder’s fingers back to where he knew his entrance was. Yifan nodded against his skin and felt around on the mattress for the lubricant as soon as Yixing released his hand.

“With or without?” Yifan asked in reference to whether or not Yixing would need stretching, and Yixing smiled against his cheek.

“I reckon I could go without,” Yixing licked a swipe across the elder’s jaw and felt him judder in response.

Yifan didn’t display any more signs of hesitance as he released Yixing’s shaft to cover his own erection in the lubricant, the half-siren continued to jerk his hips to grind against Yifan’s forearm and he could feel how the texture of it was completely different to his hand and he let out a helplessly shaky breath. He shuffled forward on his knees when he deemed Yifan to have coated his member in enough of the slippery fluid, he moved the elder’s hands away and entwined a set of their fingers together and used his own free hand to guide Yifan inside of him. He sank down onto Yifan until he was fully seated in his lap and clasped both of Yifan’s hands in his when he could, the dragon nosed at his jaw as he lifted himself upwards once he’d relaxed around the other.

The half-siren whined softly at the feeling of Yifan moving in and out of him, the dragon’s breath scorched on his collarbones while the Yixing tilted his head back in pleasure. Yixing could feel how Yifan twitched within him every so often, he felt the push and pull of the whole of the other against his walls and his prostate was gently rubbed against as he set his own pace. The stimulation was teasing until Yixing tilted them back so that Yifan was leaning over him and he whimpered as the slope directed Yifan’s erection at more of an angle so that he could feel it against the tender spot inside of him.

Like every other time they had sex like that, Yixing could feel the build up from his prostate being brushed up against. His mouth opened to groan out as one of Yifan’s hands released his to that arm around Yixing’s back to support him. The elder also began his thrusts into Yixing, aiding the younger in his pursuit of pleasure and Yixing felt the dragon’s grunts rattle right through his body, it shook his feathers and closed his eyes with minimal effort.

Yixing felt himself climbing higher and higher the longer they lasted but came crashing down with a long drawn out moan as Yifan’s hand coasted over one of his wings. His orgasm knocked the air out of him as he felt it in every part of his body, it jolted through him like bursts of electricity that ran in time with the streams of cum he shot up onto Yifan’s chest. His body reactively clenched up around Yifan’s shaft and the elder rumbled against his neck as he came straight up into Yixing with his scaled wings curling in ecstasy.

The younger’s eyes closed as he soaked in the sensations of Yifan’s warm cum, his wings shuddered on his back and fluttered in delight at the heat that was spreading within him. Yixing’s chest sagged as his lips sought out Yifan’s amongst their colliding breaths. He kissed the elder as eagerly as he could with the aftershocks of both of their orgasms vibrating within them and an overstimulated choke rushed out of Yixing’s throat when Yifan touched his wings again, his body convulsed gently and the dragon seemed to understand, his hand left the feathers and managed to seek out Yixing’s where it dangled by their sides.

“That was different,” Yifan huffed out between breaths and Yixing laughed as he used Yifan’s shoulder as a headrest. He felt a gentle breeze of air on his hot skin when Yifan's wings disappeared from around them. “I didn’t expect that.”

“Me either,” Yixing agreed, his own wings retreated back to where they stayed contained seamlessly beneath his skin.

Yixing’s hand pressed to Yifan’s hot skin, he felt how the other’s breath puffed in and out then the way his heart worked hard to push the blood around his body. The half-siren himself felt legless as he let all of his energy drain away. His muscles ached and his stomach was warm with his own ejaculate. Even with that, Yifan held him closer. Their ribcages pushed against one another in time with one another as Yixing gazed straight out of the window.

They didn’t stay in the bed for much longer after once their breaths had been caught, they skidded out of their bedroom and into the bathroom to fill the tub up with a mix of water and salt. They slipped into it as the sun began to set around them, Yifan having got in first and Yixing sat on the dragon's lap as his legs shifted into his monofin, Yixing had found himself smiling over how Yifan didn’t even flinch or look away when he saw him with his body immersed in water. The dragon kissed over where his gills layered up his neck, his hands felt the shift between his skin and scales and he complimented how Yixing’s skin shimmered under lights.

Yixing had never felt so adored with his siren half considered before and his heart was soothed by the fact that it was Yifan who was the one who was giving him that attention, he bathed in it like he did the water and never wanted to let it slip through his fingers.

 

xiii.

 

Sand curled up beneath Yixing’s toes while the wind blew his thin t-shirt around his torso with a whipping sensation and he stared out at the horizon in front of him. The beach was so wide that he could actually see how the world curved gently and didn’t remain on one plateaued line.

“Baba,” he heard a small voice call from behind him and he looked over his shoulder. He stepped across the golden grains towards the little boy and picked him up effortlessly to hold him to his hip and walked back up to where Yifan was strolling towards him whilst crouched down to hold the hand of an even smaller boy.

“Yixuan,” Yixing turned to the boy he was holding, “I thought I told you to walk Yien down.”

“Papa told me to go to you and he would come with Yi,” Yixuan wrapped his arms around Yixing’s neck while the adult directed himself back to watch Yifan. The tall male was barefoot, wearing shorts, there was a bag draped over his shoulder and he was interacting in an adorable manner with Yien. The four-year-old was a little wobbly on his feet as he stepped through the sand but Yifan’s shuffling steps meant he wasn’t rushed to get down to where Yixing was. Unlike the seven-year-old Yixing was holding, who had probably run as fast as he could towards him.

Yixing studied how Yifan looked at their child, it was saturated with love and warmth that Yixing wasn’t sure he could comprehend. He felt like his whole soul melted away whenever he watched Yifan act like the caring father he’d grown to be, the large dragon was so gentle and soft with the two small boys. Even when he was in his dragon form, he chuffed cutely with his hot breath to Yixuan and Yien to greet them and would let the two smaller dragons clamber all over his metres long scaly body.

“Why don’t you go help your little brother, okay? He’s still not good on the sand and it is a little windy today.” Yixuan’s head lifted from Yixing’s shoulder and the adult pushed the child’s hair back away from his brow line. “You think you can do that for baba?”

He nodded and Yixing set him back down on the ground, his short legs took off as soon as they could and he made it to the other two in no time at all. Yixuan grasped at Yien’s other hand and the smaller boy looked up at his older brother with a wide grin. Yifan decided to release Yien in favour of straightening out his back and it wasn’t a surprise to see that the youngest instantly clutched at Yifan’s shorts to stay by his papa’s side.

Yixing and Yifan had adopted Yixuan and Yien from two separate dragon clans, as they weren’t pureblood dragons and had one human parent each. Yifan had told Yixing about how half human dragons were often bullied by their peers because they weren’t fully dragon without their ability to breathe fire and they weren’t human enough to stay with other humans. 

They had adopted Yixuan six months after their return home when the half-dragon had just turned four. He was available to them because his clan couldn’t accept him as he was and his human parent didn’t quite know how to nurture a dragon — nor could she give him the space to roam in that he would need to not feel claustrophobic. He'd been the result of a one night stand that both his parents had regretted and his mother hadn't even known her child was half-dragon until he sprouted his wings one day.

They had found out about Yixuan when Yifan had attended a meeting with the clan leaders, bar Yifan’s parents, to discuss Yixing’s presence around them The half-siren hadn’t wanted to be trapped in a room of dragons ever again and Yifan had accepted to go alone if it would ensure that Yixing wouldn't feel endangered. 

However, when Yifan returned back with the story of a little boy in Shengzhou who didn’t quite fit in anywhere, Yixing had instantly got into the car and Yifan drove them to where the small boy was being kept. Yixing had identified with the confused boy and how it felt to not stay contained to be half of two separate species. Yifan had loved the boy when he met him, too, and the mother was more relieved that there would be somebody to look after her little boy and give him what he needed.

Yien had been a little different. They found him through Sehun after the Korean had told them about the abandoned half-dragon left with them when they were travelling in America. That time it had been Yifan who had looked at Yixing with watery eyes when he saw a photo of the small dragon curled up in a crib, they knew without meeting him that they needed him to be the fourth edition to their clan of three. So they flew to where the baby had been left with the Koreans and Yifan had claimed instantly that they wanted to adopt him. If Yifan hadn’t said it, Yixing most certainly would have.

They’d had both of the boys for almost three years and neither of them could remember much about their origins, even though Yixing and Yifan took Yixuan to see his mother three times a year. The four of them were as happy together as they could be. Yixuan had taken on the role of big brother well and would help Yien with whatever he needed if Yifan and Yixing couldn't deal with it. There were obvious stresses that the two adults went through, both as their own species and as parents, then, of course, the two boys had their own temper tantrums or fought among themselves. 

The couple went to the beach together for five days a month every month, rain or shine. It was Yifan's idea and Yixing had found Yifan utterly endearing the first time he'd tentatively stepped into the sea to join Yixing and the younger had to coax him in with the promise of kisses. He'd laughed when Yifan only waded in until the water was knee deep before a small fish brushed against his leg and he had run out back to the dry sand with a high pitched yelp.

"Xing," Yifan's voice called to him as two small hands grabbed at his legs and he felt hair brush against the fabric on his thigh. He looked down to see Yien looking out at the sea with excited eyes and Yixing's heart swelled more than he ever imagined it could.

"Yeah?" He looked over to Yifan and the older male swung the bag on his shoulder around to Yixing.

"Do you want to sort them out so they can go in the water?" Yifan's eyebrows raised towards the backpack and Yixing took it readily to dig around for a leather pouch he had packed in there before they had left.

"Baba," Yien yelled cutely for him to hurry up, his toes twitched in the sand and his hands tightened on Yixing's legs. "Faster."

Yixuan patted his brother's hair to calm him down a little as Yixing pried out what he had been searching for, the small bag clinked a little and Yixing tugged two necklaces out and the four-year-old's hands grabbed at what he recognised as his own yellow pendant.

"Yien, why don't you get ready for the water?" Yifan suggested to the small boy and Yien took his hands away to bunch up in his shirt then take it off. "Good boy. You, too, Yixuan."

Yixing placed Yien's amber fire opal amulet around his neck while humming then did the same with Yixuan's blue fire opal one once the older boy was ready to go get wet, the two children immediately took off down the sand and into the water with one another. Yifan watched the both of them as Yixing's hands rose up to the dragon's chest to feel for a bump under his shirt.

The half-siren smiled as he felt the hard lump that landed right between Yifan's sternum.

"You're wearing it," Yixing beamed, he stepped around to stand at the taller's side and watch their two children splash around in the shallows of the water.

"I never take it off," Yifan hummed when his fingers hooked under his shirt and pulled it up over his head. The elder had a thin chain around his neck and Yixing touched over where his mother's amulet hung over his lover's heart before he stripped off his own t-shirt.

Yixing had given the amulet to Yifan on their second visit to the beach, as he knew that the talisman would guard him against any other sea life in the water, especially other sirens. The half-siren had acquired the two other amulets when he'd searched through some of his father's things, there was a small box that had a small collection of them in and Yifan had wanted to give them to the children to keep them safe, as there was only so much that Yixing's presence could deter while they were in the sea. Yixing, naturally, had been in agreement with the idea when he saw his two little boys stare at the pendants in wonder. However, Yixuan and Yien couldn't yet be trusted to keep them on their's safe on their own when they weren't at the beach.

Yifan's hands rested on Yixing's hips, he gently pushed and Yixing let himself be herded towards the water where the pair of boys were splashing each other. 

It reminded him of the days where Yifan taught the other three how to swim from the side of their mountain. The lessons between the two adults had been redundant in the beginning because as soon as Yifan would touch at Yixing's wings, he'd become aroused at the slightest of brushes the elder made. However, that changed when the two boys grew up and when they touched at Yixing's wings, he felt nothing. That had led to Yifan utilising that to teach them, he could use the two young boys to move Yixing's wings about during their demonstration periods and Yixing could finally get his positioning correct without fear of arousal in front of their children.

The two small boys had also been curious about the fact that Yixing had different wings to them, that instead of scales he had feathers that ruffled in the wind. Yixing had tried to explain that he was different to them but he wasn’t sure if they were quite old enough to really realise that but Yifan did like to tell them that Yixing was an angel. It had been fine to say that until Yixuan learned that angels were often the souls of people who had died and he'd cried for nearly three hours because he thought that Yixing wasn’t alive, which in turn set Yien off because he didn’t understand anything other than the fact that his brother was sad.

Yifan stepped around Yixing at the water’s edge to go to the children and picked them both up to spin them around while Yixing went deeper in the water to remove his shorts and Yifan only put them back down when Yixing's tail could be seen flicking beneath the surface. The dragon took the item of clothing from Yixing and tucked them into the side of his own swimming shorts.

Yixuan moved out towards Yixing, the half-siren swam towards him to hold the boy closer to him and take him out deeper in the water. Yifan stood up with Yien on his shoulders to follow Yixing out in the water and sunk down onto his knees to let the four-year-old's feet dip into the sea and splash around.

It was a complete turn to see Yifan almost fully immersed in the water from what the dragon had been like in the first six years of their relationship. The sight never failed to make Yixing smile.

"Baba," Yien called out and Yixing's eyes flicked up to him from where he was watching Yixuan, "we are swimming."

The young boy tugged on Yifan's hair, it made the dragon grimace and Yixing bit back a laugh. "Yes, baby, we're swimming."

"Where are we?" Yixuan coaxed from his brother whilst Yixing's arms tightened around him.

"Oh-shin," Yien yelled and Yifan let out a long laugh at the excitement his youngest son expressed.

"It's ocean, Yi," Yixuan corrected and the other boy repeated it a few times over until the older of the two told him he had it right on his own.

"Are you getting cold?" Yixing leant towards Yixuan's ear to whisper into it.

The small boy turned to him and nodded a little. "The water is cold today, baba"

"Go to papa and he'll warm you up."

"Will he now?" Yifan chided Yixing lightly before using one of his hands to take Yixuan closer to his chest and used the other to keep Yien balanced around his neck. Luckily, the seven-year-old curled into the elder dragon easily and Yien didn't rock too much.

Nonetheless, Yien leant forward over Yifan's head to reach out for Yixing with wide grabbing hands. He took the smaller boy from Yifan's shoulders and Yien immediately moved to touch at Yixing's tail when his back was pressed to his baba's stomach. "Can you sing, baba?"

"Is that what baby wants?" Yixing queried and Yien nodded as he lost interest in the tail and copied what Yixuan had on Yifan to draw closer to Yixing's chest.

Yixing hummed softly initially, each of the necklaces began to glow with a brilliance that Yixing couldn't compare to anything as his voice gradually increased in volume. When he looked at Yifan, the dragon was watching him in awe and Yixing could see his reflection in the other's eyes. "I don't think I'll ever get used to that."

Yifan stepped closer as Yien stretched his arms out for his older brother to be closer to him and it worked out, as when Yixing opened his mouth to let his song out he had his lover and children pressed up against his side. Before long, there were other beautiful voices joining him from the depths in the distance but closer than that, Yifan hummed along, too.


End file.
